Tuesday, Jun 3, 2008    Text size: 

"New Frontier Media's financial performance during the fourth fiscal quarter was solid," New Frontier CEO Michael Weiner said of the quarter, which ended March 31. "The company's fundamentals are strong and we intend to leverage our strong balance sheet, including over $19 million of cash and investments, to pursue selective projects and acquisitions geared to future growth.

"Our fiscal year 2009 initiatives include growing our core Transactional TV business with the continued rollout of our Penthouse TV brand," Weiner said. "In addition, as a result of the strong euro and our domestic economies of scale, we expect an increase in new distribution opportunities in Europe and in the Americas. Further, as part of our international expansion efforts, we will be testing a direct-to-consumer TV set-top box technology in Europe."

New Frontier Media says it plans to use its cash flow to selectively act on these new high-growth-market opportunities.

The company's video-on-demand segment decreased 4 percent, with reported revenue of $10.7 million for the fourth quarter, as compared to $11.2 million for the same prior year quarter. Pay-per-view revenue increased during the current quarter to $5.3 million from $5.2 million in the same prior year quarter, but video-on-demand revenue was flat at $5.3 million and C-band and other revenue decreased to $200,000 from $700,000 in the prior year quarter. C-band service was discontinued during the quarter ended Dec. 31.

The company's film production segment reported revenue dropped to $1.4 million for the current quarter as compared to $2.5 million in the same prior year quarter. Owned product revenue decreased to $1.1 million during the current quarter from $1.9 million in the same prior year quarter. The declines were partially offset by an increase in video-on-demand revenue.

The film production segment generated an operating loss of $300,000 for the fourth quarter as compared to operating income of $300,000 during the same prior year quarter.

The company's Internet divison reported net revenue of $500,000 for the last two fourth quarters. The loss from operations for the Internet segment was $200,000 for each of the quarters.

A webcast to discuss earnings will be available for viewing on the New Frontier Media website later today.