Excluding currency effects, Agfa HealthCare's third quarter revenue decreased 4.6 percent. In the Imaging segment, the growth for Computed Radiography (CR) and Direct Radiography (DR) was counterbalanced by the decline for traditional X-ray film products. The Imaging IT segment was influenced by the uncertain economic conditions, as certain governments scaled down their healthcare budgets and hospitals are postponing their planned investments. The Enterprise IT business' revenue remained stable.
Brazil posted significant growth in digital applications, whereas business in North America was soft. Northern Europe performed well. Business in the South of Europe suffered from the economic slowdown.
Despite the ongoing film price increases, the gross profit margin decreased to 32.2 percent, versus 39.7 percent in the third quarter of 2010. Agfa HealthCare's profitability was influenced by the high silver price, product mix changes and the production inefficiencies resulting from the reduced use of the Group's film production capacity. The business group’s recurring EBITDA amounted to 17.0 million Euro (or 6.4 percent of revenue). Recurring EBIT amounted to 6.1 million Euro, or 2.3 percent of revenue.
In September, Agfa HealthCare announced the acquisition of WPD, one of the leading healthcare IT companies in Brazil. Through this acquisition, Agfa HealthCare enters the Hospital Information Systems market in Brazil, where it already has a strong position with its imaging and imaging IT solutions.
In the field of Imaging IT, Agfa HealthCare and Barco launched a new joint program to refresh the diagnostic display systems that are running IMPAX PACS solutions. The program provides customers with access to the latest diagnostic display technology that meets the demands of new trends in imaging IT. At the 2011 Congress of the European Society of Cardiology in Paris, Agfa HealthCare launched three new cardiology reporting modules. The new modules allow digital reporting for Cardiac CT, Transcatheter Aortic Valve Implantation and Congenital Echocardiography.
In Imaging, the group purchase division of the Premier healthcare alliance awarded Agfa HealthCare a new three-year multi-source contract for its entire line of diagnostic film, dry media and imagers. Premier counts 2,500 member hospitals and 75,000 other healthcare sites in the USA. Early October, Agfa HealthCare announced the signing of a new three-year contract for DR with Novation. The contract offers Novation's more than 30,000 member organizations in the USA access to Agfa HealthCare's broad range of DR systems. Agfa HealthCare also has PACS and CR contracts with Novation.
In the '2011 top 20 Best in KLAS Awards: Medical Equipment and Infrastructure', Agfa HealthCare was again named category leader for single plate CR. Agfa HealthCare's CR 30-X digitizer was the No. 1 ranked CR product for the third consecutive year. KLAS is a research firm specializing in monitoring and reporting the performance of healthcare vendors.
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- Agfa HealthCare's Profile
About Agfa
The Agfa-Gevaert Group is one of the world’s leading companies in imaging and information technology. Agfa develops manufactures and markets analogue and digital systems for the printing industry (Agfa Graphics), for the healthcare sector (Agfa HealthCare), and for specific industrial applications (Agfa Materials). Agfa is headquartered in Mortsel, Belgium. The company is present in 40 countries and has agents in another 100 countries around the globe. The Agfa-Gevaert Group achieved a turnover of 2,948 million euro in 2010.
About Agfa HealthCare
Agfa HealthCare, a member of the Agfa-Gevaert Group, is a leading global provider of diagnostic imaging and healthcare IT solutions. The company has nearly a century of healthcare experience and has been a pioneer on the healthcare IT market since the early 1990's. Today Agfa HealthCare designs, develops and delivers state-of-the-art systems for capturing, managing and processing diagnostic images and clinical/administrative information for hospitals and healthcare facilities, as well as contrast media solutions to enable effective medical imaging results. The company has sales offices and agents in over 100 markets worldwide. Sales for Agfa HealthCare in 2010 were 1,180 million euro.