MUMBAI, June 13: Siemens Ltd, the Indian arm of German multinational Siemens AG, has suffered a severe setback in its performance during the 12-month period ended March 1997. The company has suffered a net loss of Rs 84.53 crore during the period against a net profit of Rs 37.24 crore during the same period last year.The company has changed its financial year to end on September 1997 ``in order to coincide with the financial year of its parent company Siemens AG.''According to J Schubert, managing director, the setback was mainly due to discontinued operations, which mainly related to the former telecommunication (TCM) activities which are being transferred to Siemens Public Communications Networks Ltd (SPCNL), exceptional items which include cost of restructuring the business operations of the company and deterioration in the operating performance of its main businesses due to higher operating costs, lower capacity utilization, higher interest burden and additional risks provisions.The sales turnover rose by 10% to Rs 1166.5 crore compared with Rs 1058.1 crore in the previous year. ``The major growth drivers were the power generation, power transmission and distribution and project divisions, which registered double-digit growth, based on considerable order backlog,'' he said.Announcing the working results here today, Schubert said Siemens received new orders valued at Rs 1184.8 crore as compared to with Rs 1446.3 crore, representing an overall decline of 18 % over the previous year. The previous year's figures were substantially influenced by the award of the Paguthan power project.
