Xaar reaffirms full year revenue guidance

Digital inkjet print technology group Xaar said sales in the second half to date have been broadly consistent with its performance in the first six months of the year and it continues to expect full year revenue to be in the range of £92-95m.

This would be a decline from last year’s £109.2m.

Monthly sales volumes in ceramic tile printing, the company’s largest end applications, have been fairly consistent but more recently it has seen some softening in demand from the largest market, China.

Xaar said sales into packaging in the second half have been encouraging, supported by a strong presence at the Labelexpo show in September by its OEM label printer partners.

In addition, the company noted the launch of the Xaar Print Bar System at the show, a new product which adds single-pass digital inkjet capability to existing analogue printing equipment

It said the launch has generated a significant amount of interest and it expects to be selling the first Print Bar units early next year.

Xaar said it remains in a strong financial position, with net cash at the end of October of £66.9m, compared with £58.6m at the end of June.

At 1000 GMT, Xaar shares were down 5% at 478.75p.