Lucent ‘severely impacted’ by Winstar bankruptcy

Lucent Technologies lost $3.69 billion in its second quarter, a figure it partially blamed on the demise of customer Winstar Communications.

The loss for the three months ended March 31 2001 included $2.7 billion in one-time costs, such as 2,000 of the 10,000 job cuts previously announced. It compared to a net profit of $755 million for Q2, 2000.

The New Jersey-based telecomms equipment manufacturer reported a loss per share of $1.08, compared to earnings of 23 cents per share last year.

Sales dropped 18 per cent from Q1 2000 to $5.92 billion, but revenues were up 36 per cent compared to the final three months of 2000.

Lucent said its results were "significantly impacted" by Winstar, which recently filed for bankruptcy. Losses from loans to Winstar, together with write-offs from other investments, totalled 15 cents per share in the quarter.

Lucent, an AT&T spin-off, has been hit by a string of disasters - last year it issued a steady flow of profit warnings, ousted its CEO Richard McGinn, and was forced to restate its fourth quarter sales.

"Lucent delivered much-improved performance in the quarter, despite continued softness in several key markets worldwide," said Henry Schact, Lucent chairman and CEO.

The company expects things to pick up when it sees the full impact of the restructure in the third and fourth quarters - the remaining 8,000 job cuts will go during this quarter.

"As we've said, fiscal year 2001 is a transition and rebuilding year for Lucent," said Schact. ®

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