Assa Abloy Group (OMX: ASSA B) had a fluid fourth quarter 2011. The lock maker grew organically at 4% clip and 22% taking acquisition of Cardo and 18 others into account for sales of over 11.7 billion Swedish kroner. Overall markets were stable in Europe and North America and grew strongly in the rest of the world.
Net income was down to 120 million on one-off items and restructuring charges but excluding those was a healthy 1.285 billion. Operating cash flow was also a record at near 2.8 billion. For the full year sales totalled 41,786 million with EBIT at 6,624 million and earnings per share 12.30. The Board is proposing a dividend increase to 4.50 SEK.
M&A activity has kept busy. ActivIdentity and LaserCard were acquired for the group to be able to offer complete systems for advanced public ID solutions. The Crawford (Cardo) acquisitions was done with the growing field of entrance automation in mind. Acquitisions of industrial door manufacturer Albany Door Systems and window hardware maker Securistyle were completed recently. An agreement for acquisition of high speed industrial roll-up door maker Dynaco was another quarterly highlight.
A large restructuring program has begun and a total of 17 production units will be shut down. The company estimate payback time for the restructuring costs from the program to be just over three years. Thus far 5894 people have been let go with another 1644 set to leave by the end of 2014 for a grand total of 7538. The stock is up 1.5% as the rest of the market is languishing nearly 1% in the red one hour into the session.
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