Mitsubishi Chemical Targets Operating Profit Margin of 10 Pct in 2015
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Tokyo, May 31 (Jiji Press)--Mitsubishi Chemical Holdings Corp.  President Yoshimitsu Kobayashi said Thursday the company aims to double its group operating profit margin from the current 5 pct in 2015.
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Renault beats expectations with a 40% rise in net profits in 2004 although it warns that margins will be lower this year.
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Bayer AG, Germany s second-biggest drug and chemical maker, had a third consecutive quarterly profit and boosted its sales and earnings targets as demand grew for plastics and chemicals.
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Hard-pressed Japanese automaker Mitsubishi Motors Corp. posted a big half-year loss on Monday and widened its full-year net loss projection even as it aims to tame a domestic sales plunge with its newly launched compact car.
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By Kyodo News International, Tokyo  Feb. 8--TOKYO -- Mitsubishi Chemical Holdings Corp. said Thursday it will  convert Mitsubishi Plastics Inc. into a wholly owned subsidiary to reorganize  the functional materials business within its group.
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Tokyo, Feb. 1 (Jiji Press)--Mitsubishi Gas Chemical Co. , major trader Itochu Corp.  and seven other firms will jointly set up a company in the central Japan city of Niigata in April to produce dimethyl ether for use as fuel, they said Thursday.
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Diversified manufacturer United  Technologies Corp. UTX.N on Friday said quarterly profit rose  10.5 percent as the construction boom in Asia boosted its Otis  elevator and Carrier heating and air conditioning businesses.
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Caterpillar Inc.  said on Friday its profit in the latest quarter rose more than 10 percent as strong international mining, energy and construction sales offset a decline in U.S. equipment and engine sales.
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Automaker DaimlerChrysler AG said Friday it will charge 400 million euros (&#36;492 million) against earnings in the third quarter to cover the cost of recalls and past quality problems at Japanese truckmaker Mitsubishi Fuso Truck and Bus Corp, which is 65 percent owned by DaimlerChrysler.
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TOKYO : Scandal-hit Japanese automaker Mitsubishi Motors interim net loss nearly doubled to 146.16 billion yen (1.38 billion dollars) and is to downgrade its full-year earnings forecast.
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Sun Microsystems Inc., which turned a rare profit last quarter, is on track to reach its previously stated goal of a 4 percent operating profit margin by the end of the fiscal year, the company's chief financial officer said Tuesday.
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By Kyodo News International, Tokyo  Feb. 8--TOKYO -- Mitsubishi Heavy Industries Ltd. said Thursday its group  net profit swelled 83.3 percent from a year earlier to 38.46 billion yen in  the April-December period on strong sales at its shipbuilding, power systems  and machinery divisions.
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TOKYO Mizuho Financial Group, the world&#39;s second-largest bank by assets, on Monday raised its profit forecast by a third on expectations that the cost of bad-loan disposals would fall, compensating for a decline in revenue.
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Text of report in English by official Chinese news agency Xinhua (New China News Agency)  ["China Aims To Save 69 Bln Cubic Meters of Water by 2010" - Xinhua headline]  Beijing, Feb.
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The toy maker reported a 15 percent increase in its second-quarter profit on global sales of Barbie dolls and Hot Wheels toy cars that offset U.S. declines.
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Japan's Mitsubishi Motors Corp. is reviewing its alliance with DaimlerChrysler, including their cooperation in manufacturing mid-sized sedans, the company said Thursday.
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(InfoWorld) - Sun Microsystems, buoyed by its first profitable quarter in more than a year and a half, said Tuesday it has a goal of generating an operating margin of 10 percent by its 2009 fiscal year. Sun executives set the goal, though they cautioned that a lot of things have to happen in order to reach it, during a conference with analysts Tuesday in San Francisco. Sun CEO Jonathan Schwartz said increased adoption of Sun's freely-distributed Solaris operating system,Â its recently announced partnership with Intel, and other strategic moves, will help it grow revenue. At the same time, said Sun CFO Michael Lehman, the company will continue to reduce its cost structure using a number of levers, though not employee layoffs. "Our cost structure is still too high," Lehman said, "but we do not intend to have a big layoff and just lower the numbers." The company is going to reduce general and administrative expenses and research and development spending as a percentage of revenue so that those expenses provide a better return, he said. For example, Sun is converting its own business software infrastructure to standardize on Oracle's 11i bundle of enterprise resource planning software, including general ledger, payroll, andÂ CRM software. The conversion is expected to cost more than $200 million, Lehman said, but it will save Sun the expense of having to manage 1,000 different types of software throughout its company. "We have put a stake in the ground, and we are on a journey," Lehman said. Sun posted net income of $126 million, or $0.03 per share, on $3.566 billion in revenue, in its fiscal 2007 second quarter ended Dec. 31, 2006. It was Sun's first profitable quarter after five successive quarterly losses. Sun recorded an operating margin of 2.9 percent in the second quarter and forecasts a 4 percent operating margin in its fourth quarter. On the revenue side, Schwartz said the company's decision to give away its Solaris operating system and open source its Java software create opportunities for Sun to sell hardware and services to those users. Sun's recently announced deal with Intel to install Intel processors in its servers, while Intel markets Solaris, will also create new sales opportunities. "We are now fully outfitted to pursue 100 percent of the market. There is no opportunity that we are precluded from bidding on. There is no customer that we cannot serve," Schwartz said. Sun's turnaround strategy is finally showing up in its financials, said Nathan Brookwood, an industry analyst with Insight 64, a research firm. "You had to take it on faith a year ago." Sun previously only sold servers and workstations running its Sparc processors. Now, because it also uses Intel and AMD processors, it can appeal to broader markets, said Brookwood. "Three years ago if you wanted to buy hardware from Sun, you had to sign up for the Sparc religion. Some people believe in other religions, and they didn't want to have to do a religious conversion to buy from Sun," he said. Sun's operating margin goals seem "conservative" to Sun financial analyst Andrew Neff of Bear Stearns & Co. In a research note to investors, Neff, who also attended the conference, said "Sun has more work to do on costs, [but] we believe its outlook can further improve."