Hitachi Ltd. said Wednesday its group net profit in the year that ended in March jumped nearly six-fold from a year earlier to a record 501.61 billion yen ($4.6 billion) due to robust demand for IT-related services and cost-cutting efforts.

The outcome, also boosted by a special profit of 278.8 billion yen from the sale of its chemical unit to Showa Denko K.K. in the April-June quarter, beat its earnings projection released in February for a net profit of 370 billion yen.

The Japanese industrial conglomerate said on the same day that it will sell a more than 50 percent stake in its metals unit for 382 billion yen to a consortium of investment funds led by U.S. private equity fund Bain Capital.

Hitachi Metals Ltd., currently listed on the Tokyo Stock Exchange, posted a net loss of 42.2 billion yen in the year through March, a record red-ink figure for the second consecutive year. It has also announced that it will cut about 3,200 jobs mainly in Japan.

Hitachi has rapidly overhauled its group businesses to concentrate on the information technology sector, while shedding non-core operations.

In fiscal 2020, Hitachi posted a group operating profit of 495.18 billion yen, down 25.2 percent, on sales of 8.73 trillion yen, down 0.4 percent.

Hitachi projects that its net profit will rise 9.6 percent to 550 billion yen in the year ending March 2022.

==Kyodo

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