Alcatel-Lucent has maintained its full-year earnings expectations despite recording a wider-than-expected loss in the second quarter.
The European-US vendor reported a net loss of €184 million ($240m), versus a profit of €14 million the year before.
While analysts had already predicted a loss, they had it pegged at just €146.2 million, according to the averages from a Bloombergpoll.
The company reported revenue of €3.81 billion, a 2.4% fall on 2Q09, with sales of fixed access, switching and optical gear only “partially offset” by growth in IP and W-CDMA sales.
The services business – a key growth area for vendors facing a long-term decline in equipment sales – contracted at a “mid single digit rate,” while Asia Pacific revenue fell in double digits because of a slowdown in China buildouts.
Gross profit at €1.38 billion was around 36% of revenues, compared to 33.1% a year and 32.6% in Q1.