Cochlear FY13 profit recovers after recall

Cochlear Limited (ASX:COH) says its net profit for FY13 grew 133% to $132.6 million, as the company recovered from an expensive product recall the year earlier.

Cochlear was in FY12 forced to recall its Nucleus Cl500 implants due to a higher-than-expected failure rate of the devices. The costs dragged down the company’s FY12 profit by 68% to $56.8 million.

But excluding the impact of the $101.3 million in recall costs from FY12, underlying net profit for FY13 was down 16%, and revenue fell 3% to $752.7 million.

The net profit result for the year was squarely in the middle of the estimate that Cochlear had released in June.

The company reported record cochlear implant sales of 26,674 units in FY13, up 16% from FY12. Bone anchored solutions sales also increased 1% to $78.6 million.

Broken down by region, a 20% increase in sales from Asia-Pacific counteracted a 4% decline in sales from the Americas and a 1% dip in sales from EMEA.

Excluding foreign exchange impacts, revenue would have increased 3%.

Cochlear CEO Dr Chris Roberts said the company is well positioned for growth in FY14 due to the in-progress European rollout of its new Nucleus 6 implants.

Cochlear shares were trading 0.41% lower at $58.080 as of around 1 pm on Monday.