TOKYO, Oct 30 (Reuters) - Panasonic Holdings raised its full-year operating profit forecast by 20% to 710 billion yen ($4.5 billion) on Friday, helped by a range of factors including stronger-than-expected AI-related demand.
• The Japanese company lifted its group operating profit forecast for the year ending March 2027 from 590 billion yen previously, raising it for the second successive quarter
• Group CEO Yuki Kusumi told reporters that AI-related demand had been stronger than expected. He added
that the extent of the improvement had been a "surprise", even though he had expected some room for a further upgrade
• Factors behind the upgrade included a boost from price changes, favourable foreign exchange rates, the absence of the US tariff impact seen a year earlier and higher AI-linked sales at its Industry business
• Operating profit at its key Energy unit, which supplies electric-vehicle batteries to Tesla and other EV makers, surged to 55.6 billion yen in the second quarter from 1.2 billion yen a year earlier
• Panasonic also raised the unit's full-year profit forecast for the year ending March 2027 by 16% to 198 billion yen from 171 billion yen previously
• It said the unit's quarterly operating profit grew due to higher sales of EV batteries in North America and data centre energy storage systems
• The Industry business benefited from higher sales of capacitors and multilayer circuit-board materials for AI infrastructure
($1 = 157.5300 yen)
(Reporting by Daniel Leussink; Editing by Christian Schmollinger and Sonia Cheema, Kirsten Donovan)
