After being hit by a major accounting scandal, Japan’s Olympus Corp – drew the line and forecasted a 32 billion loss yen for 2011 fiscal year. The camera and medical equipment maker, who admitted to a 13 year long fraud, predicted a bigger hole than the previous analysts’ estimates.
There have been rumors related to the company’s attempt to get back on its feet. Fujifilm Holdings, Sony Corp, Panasonic and South Korea’s Samsung Electronics are expected to surface as potential investment partners especially in Olympus’ relatively profitable endoscope business. For the fiscal third quarter, Olympus, seem to manage to hold on a 70 percent of the global market in diagnostic endoscopes. Even so, compared with the 2.04 billion yen of revenue cashed in a year earlier, the company has posted a 756 million yen loss as well.
The accounting scandal all started when Olympus chief executive of the British branch Michael Woodford was fired, after raising questions about the way the company was handling its book keeping. Since then, shares have been going down the drain, and reaching half their initial value, thus leaving the over all market value of the company of just $4.5 billion.
The company still faces criminal charges and shareholder lawsuits against executives present and gone, which the company has been suspecting of being involved in the 13-year book keeping scandal.
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