Demand for imaging helps double profits

A steady showing from its core business areas helped

, the developer and manufacturer of high-tech electronic components and sub-systems, to boost sales by almost 12 per cent and more than double its profits to £12m compared with 2005.

The company's three divisions — medical and science, aerospace and defence and commercial and industrial — all made a positive contribution to the results, with medical and science in particular recording a 34 per cent increase in sales to £21m. This came on the back of increasing demand for its imaging products, particularly the intra-oral X-ray dental sensor and L3Vision sensors for life sciences applications, said the company.

Although there was a drop-off in sales for aerospace and defence within the company's sensor division, e2v said it had confirmed its position as a key supplier to the Eurofighter Typhoon programme, with orders for solid-state sensors worth £2.5m and a contract to supply sensors for the second phase of the plane's Missile Approach Warning System.

Space success meant that e2v's charge coupled imaging device (CCD) was used on board NASA's New Horizon's mission to Pluto and ESA's voyage to Venus. Within e2v's electronic tubes division, sales to the aerospace and defence sector grew by 77 per cent, mainly due to the rapid completion of a £6.7m MoD contract to supply electronic sub-systems.

With an order book up 23 per cent and the successful integration of its first acquisition — Gresham Scientific Instruments, a manufacturer of x-ray spectrometry systems — the company said it was confident of progress in Europe and

in the coming year.

Its imaging business will focus on broadening the technology base from CCDs to include CMOS technology, which offers increased chip functionality, radiation hardness and higher-speed performance.

Following the success of the Argus 3 thermal imaging camera, which was used successfully during the Buncefield oil depot explosion, the company anticipates good progress in the fire-fighting business in the new financial year following the launch of its successor, the Argus 4, in April.