NOK upgrades business outlook despite dip in vehicle production

Tokyo – NOK Corp. has upgraded its previous forecasts for net sales and operating income due largely to changes in the trading environment for its seals business, the Japanese group has announced.

Group-wide, NOK now expects sales for its fiscal year ended 31 March 2025 to come in at Yen744.7 billion, up from Yen708.3 billion forecast in May, and operating income to reach Yen28.0 billion compared to a previously predicted Yen21.8 billion.

 The revision reflects better-than-expected returns from initiatives to raise prices and reduce costs as well as favourable changes in foreign exchange-rate assumptions, said its 2 Aug statement.

 The upgrade is despite NOK’s anticipation that sales in the seals business will be lower than the previous forecasts “mainly because of lower automotive vehicle production volume in each region; Japan, China and ASEAN.”

 In addition, it has changed foreign exchange rate assumptions for the remaining period of the fiscal year after July 1, 2024, to JPY150/USD from a previous assumption of JPY140/USD.

For its last fiscal year, NOK’s seals business posted revenues of Yen362.6 billion, around 48% of group sales – slightly above the percentage of revenues generated by NOK’s electronic products business.