Japan’s Nidec posts higher third-quarter operating profit

TOKYO (Reuters) -Japanese electric motor maker Nidec posted a 5% rise in third-quarter operating profit on Thursday as the company said it benefited from strong demand for data centre power generators and battery energy storage systems.

Operating profit for the three months to December-end totalled 54.5 billion yen ($348 million), compared to 51.8 billion yen for the same period a year earlier. That was below than the 62.3 billion yen profit estimated by analysts surveyed by LSEG.

The Kyoto-based firm stuck to its full-year outlook for an operating profit of 240 billion yen for the year to end-March, nearly 50% better than the year earlier.

The company said its performance was weaker on a quarter-to-quarter basis, declining 10% in the third quarter compared to the previous three months, as it faced impacts from delays in the supply of next-generation graphics processing units and a downturn in the European market for automotive products.

Nidec has sought to benefit from a surge in demand for water-cooling modules for AI data centres, previously saying the business could expand to 1 trillion yen in sales in the future, without further specifying exact timing.

The company has also bet heavily on the growth of the global market for electric vehicles through developing and making an e-axle traction motor that combines an EV’s gear, motor and power-control electronics.

Nidec announced a 257-billion-yen unsolicited bid for machine tool maker Makino Milling Machine in December.

($1 = 156.5300 yen)