Fading demand for older copiers cited
Xerox, the largest U.S. seller of copiers, said Thursday that its first-quarter earnings fell 15 percent amid slowing demand for the company's older black-and-white machines.
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Net income dropped to $210 million, or 20 cents a share, from $248 million, or 25 cents, a year earlier, when the company had a gain from the sale of assets. Revenue fell 1.5 percent to $3.77 billion. Currency gains increased sales by 2 percent. Xerox was expected to earn 19 cents on sales of $3.86 billion, the average estimate of at least seven analysts surveyed by Thomson Financial.
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Slowing demand in Brazil also hurt results, the company said. Under Anne Mulcahy, the chief executive, Xerox has cut at least 17,000 jobs and hired other companies to make Xerox products, reducing costs and allowing Xerox to sell new, lower-priced products to compete with Canon, Ricoh and Hewlett-Packard.
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Xerox had a gain of $83 million, or 8 cents a share, a year earlier from the sale of its remaining stake in ContentGuard, a U.S. maker of anti-piracy software. (Bloomberg)
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