Pioneer Corp. said Friday it swung back into the black in the April-June quarter on the back of growth in sales of car audio products and others related to Blu-ray disc drives.
For the first three months of the business year, Pioneer said it logged a group net profit of ¥598 million, compared with a year-earlier loss of ¥4.10 billion, and a group operating profit of ¥2.37 billion against a loss of ¥8.76 billion a year earlier, on sales of ¥109.85 billion, up 14.7 percent from a year earlier.
Although the electronics maker suffered from poor sales of plasma displays and the stronger yen, Pioneer said it benefited from the launch of its optical disc joint venture with Sharp Corp., seeing increased sales of Blu-ray products.
Pioneer, which withdrew from the money-losing plasma display business, had agreed with Sharp to integrate their optical disc operations under a joint venture to expand their presence in the growing Blu-ray market.
Pioneer said sales of its car audio products were boosted by growth in Latin American and European markets.