The parent company of Flight Structures Inc. of Marysville climbed out of the red in the third quarter as airline orders for jet interiors grew to a record level.
B/E Aerospace reported a profit of $10 million for the quarter, compared with a loss of $2.7 million in the same period of 2004. On a diluted per-share basis, earnings climbed to 16 cents, compared with a loss of 7 cents in the third quarter last year.
B/E reported its revenues grew 18 percent in the quarter, to $217.1 million. As a result of the increased sales, the company’s orders backlog has reached a record of more than $1 billion.
For the first nine months of the year, B/E had a profit of $22.5 million on net sales of $621.2 million. That was up from the $12.7 million loss B/E showed in the first nine months of 2004 on sales of $543.9 million.
The stronger-than-expected orders were due mostly to airlines buying new interiors for existing planes, B/E chief executive Robert Khoury said.
Company executives also were encouraged by their success in landing a $40 million order for B/E’s new line of coach class seats. This is only the second major coach-class overhaul in recent years, and it could signal “the onset of the long-awaited coach class retrofit cycle,” Khoury said.
B/E also received a contract from Boeing to develop, certify and produce kits for installing its Connexion Internet service on 777s and 767s.
The company is optimistic that Airbus and the Boeing Co. appear poised to increase production of their wide-body jets, Khoury said. Interiors for those jets are five to eight times more costly than those for single-aisle jets.
“The scheduled deliveries of wide-body aircraft, coupled with the continued recovery in the business jet sector, bode well for continued strong revenue growth for at least the next three years,” Khoury said.
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