Danaher Profit Rises on Acquisitions

   By Anne Steele 
 

Industrial conglomerate Danaher Corp. on Tuesday posted a 4% increase in profit, handily beating expectations as recent acquisitons boosted results.

The Washington, D.C.-based company said its acquisition of Pall Corp. helped increase its top-line growth by 17.5%. Still, the company faced foreign-exchange volatility that it said reduced its top line by 5%.

The company also said it expects adjusted earnings in its first fiscal quarter of 2016 will be in the range of $1 to $1.04 a share. Analysts polled by Thomson Reuters are looking for $1.04 a share.

Chief Executive Thomas Joyce pointed to double-digit earnings growth in the most recent quarter.

"Despite the more challenging economic landscape, particularly in our industrially oriented markets, we continue to execute well," he said.

For the quarter ended Dec. 31, the company posted a profit of $688.6 million, or 99 cents a share, up from $661.7 million or 92 cents a share a year earlier. Excluding certain items, earnings on a per-share basis were $1.27 compared with $1.06 a year earlier.

Revenue climbed 12.6% to $5.88 billion. Revenue excluding the boon from acquisitions was flat.

Danahar had forecast adjuested earnings between $1.25 and $1.29 a share on $5.53 billion in revenue.

In May, Danaher Corp said it agreed to buy Pall for about $13.6 billion and unveiled plans to split itself into two separate companies.

Pall, based in Port Washington, N.Y., sells purification and filtration products to a wide range of customers, including biopharmaceutical companies, airplane manufactures, brewers and municipal water suppliers.

The two resulting businesses would be a science and technology company, which would include Pall, and an industry company. The science business is slated to keep the Danaher name and include Danaher's life-sciences and diagnostics and dental segments, as well as its water-quality and product-identification platforms. The company hopes to complete the split around the end of 2016.

Write to Anne Steele at [e-mail].

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

January 26, 2016 06:40 ET (11:40 GMT)

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