Business Jul. 03, 2009 - 04:16AM JST ( 1 )

TOKYO —

KDDI Corp. reported that its net profit for the fiscal year climbed 2.3 percent but failed to meet market expectations as a 32 percent year-on-year drop in the number of handsets sold at the company’s mobile business prompted a decline in revenue.

The telecom company reported fiscal 2009 net income of 222.7 billion yen (US$2.27 billion) for the year ended March 31. That compared with a net income of 217.8 billion yen (US$2.22 billion) for fiscal 2008. Analysts had expected a net profit of 261.0 billion yen (US$2.66 billion) for the recently-ended fiscal year. However, for the recent January-March quarter, KDDI swung to a loss of 31.2 billion yen (US$0.32 billion). At the same time a year ago, it earned 3.0 billion yen. Operating revenue for the fiscal year fell to 3.5 trillion yen (US$36.7 billion).

JCN