Agilent Profit Declines on Soft Asia Sales; Shares Plummet

Agilent Technologies on Tuesday posted third-quarter net earnings of $185 million, or 45 cents per share, down from $227 million, or 54 cents per share, during the same quarter a year ago.

Shares of the company plummetted more than 12.5 percent after U.S. markets closed Tuesday.

Excluding share-based compensation expense and $18 million of tax and other net benefits, the measurement-equipment maker reported third quarter adjusted net income of $194 million, or 48 cents per share.

The Santa Clara, Calif.-based company reported revenue during the quarter of $1.37 billion, 11 percent above last year's third quarter but just below the company's forecast. Orders for the three months ended July 31, 2007 were $1.31 billion, 7 percent above the year-ago quarter.

A Thomson Financial analyst survey had called for a profit of 49 cents per share, on revenue of $1.39 billion.

"Agilent met its aggressive performance targets, despite very divergent market trends during the third quarter," Bill Sullivan, Agilent president and chief executive, said in a statement.

"Bio-analytical markets were strong across the board, and the performance of our segment was even more robust," Sullivan said. "Electronic measurement markets were solid in the Americas and Europe, but surprisingly weak in Asia, particularly Japan."

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