Japanese electronics maker Sanyo said today that it had sunk deep into the red in the first-half of the year and said it was forecasting a big full-year loss, as it continues to be wounded by fierce competition in televisions, DVD players and other markets.
The company plunged to a net loss of 142.52 billion yen ($1.20 billion) in the six months to September from a profit of 3.4 billion yen a year earlier. Revenue declined to 1.19 trillion yen from 1.26 trillion yen.
Sanyo is accelerating 14,000 planned job cuts and pulling out of loss-making lines as it battles a slump in revenues from digital home appliances sales.
For the second time in as many months, the Osaka-based group raised its projected net loss for the full-year, to 233 billion yen from 140 billion yen.
In September, Sanyo said it would stop selling loss-making traditional DVD players and video cassette recorders and focus on next-generation DVD players and rear-projection and cathode-ray tube televisions instead.
This financial year is proving a tough one for many of Japan's electronics heavyweights, with Sony forecasting a loss of 10 billion yen.
Sanyo, which began in 1947 making bicycle lamps in Osaka, brought in Tomoyo Nonaka, a former television anchorwoman with no experience in corporate management or electronics, to become its new chairwoman and chief executive earlier this year.
