Abcam ’09 sales higher than expected, helped by weak sterling
Abcam plc, the bioscience company that markets antibodies via its own online catalogue, said trading in the second half of the year to end June has been strong and the exchange rate has been more favourable than expected due to the continued weakness of sterling.
As a result, Abcam said in a trading update statement, that sales for the financial year ended slightly ahead of its earlier expectations.
The Cambridge-based company said gross margins have also been strong, which, together with the ongoing control of costs and operational leverage inherent in the business, means that it anticipates the profit before tax will be around 9% ahead of current market consensus.
Restructuring of the production facility in Cambridge has been completed successfully and an impairment charge of £1.1m (£0.8m after tax) for fixed assets that are no longer of use in the business will be taken in the second half of the year.
The company said that "whilst it is difficult to assess what impact if any the current economic climate is having on trading because of the defensive features of our market and business model, we continue to exercise a degree of caution when assessing future prospects as policy-makers around the world respond to unprecedented challenges.
"There also remains the potential for further significant volatility in exchange rates, which we have mitigated in part by selling forward a substantial portion of our planned excess foreign currency for the 2009/10 financial year."
The preliminary results for the 2009 financial year will be announced in early September.
