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To: Peter V who wrote (43722)	8/5/1999 3:06:00 PM
From: BillyG	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 50808

Compaq's Asia-Pacific sales are up sharply (and these numbers don't include Japan and China!)............ news.com Compaq sees Asia-Pacific sales bouncing back By Bloomberg News Special to CNET News.com August 5, 1999, 5:00 a.m. PT Compaq, the giant personal computer maker, said it expects Asia-Pacific sales for 1999 to reach levels achieved before the region's economic crisis broke out in mid-1997. The projection--which is a year ahead of its schedule--comes as its sales in the region rose 14 percent in the second quarter from a year ago, the highest quarterly revenue in two years. Compaq defines the region as Asia outside of Japan and greater China. Compaq's strong Asia-Pacific sales are important as the Houston-based company struggles to revamp its loss-making business and fire workers to cut costs. Its Asia-Pacific market--where profit targets were met--made up 6 percent of its $9.42 billion revenue for the three months. "Even if we kept to our original targets for the second half, our strong first half will get us to those precrisis levels," Paul Chan, Compaq's Asia-Pacific vice president and managing director, said in an interview, adding that "we continue to see very strong growth in Asia." South Korea was the best-performer, where sales to distributors tripled from a year earlier. In Australia, these shipments rose 19 percent. Sales to Southeast Asian countries such as Indonesia, Malaysia, and Thailand, which were among the hardest hit markets during the crisis, were up 28 percent. "What we've seen is that manufacturing output and business commerce activities have in fact increased," Chan said. "With better sentiment, companies and individuals are playing out their sentiments and making investments for information technology infrastructure and upgrade." Job cuts Compaq's second-quarter sales in the region also gained 19 percent from the previous three months. The first quarter saw an unusual increase following the fourth-quarter last year, which is a traditionally strong three months because of the year-end holiday season. Still, at a global level, it reported a second-quarter loss of $184 million as it struggled with falling PC prices. It's also cutting as many as 8,000 jobs to cut costs. Chan wouldn't say if these would affect his region but offered a hint of optimism. "I can tell you one thing: Asia is a growing region and we will not be cutting out our revenue generating capability and our customer satisfaction capability," he said. Compaq's regional personal computer sales to distributors rose 19 percent in the second quarter. It also saw strong gains in high-end computers and peripheral businesses such as information technology services to companies, which now make up 40 percent of its sales in the region, he said. Copyright 1999, Bloomberg L.P. All Rights Reserved.