(Reuters) - British engineering conglomerate Smiths Group (LON:SMIN) Plc reported higher-than-expected full-year revenue and pretax profit, helped by improved sales at two of its units as well as cost cuts.
Shares of the company rose 1.7 percent to 1,411 pence at 0800 GMT on Wednesday on the London Stock Exchange.
Smiths reported pretax profit of 510 million pounds for the full-year ended July 31, beating analysts' average estimate of 422.45 million pounds, according to Thomson Reuters I/B/E/S.
Smiths said underlying full-year revenue fell nearly 2 percent, but including the benefit of a weaker pound, revenue rose 2 percent to 2.95 billion pounds. Analysts were expecting revenue of 2.88 billion pounds.
Full-year revenue fell at the company's John Crane unit, which makes mechanical seals and other products for customers such as BP (LON:BP) Plc, Shell (LON:RDSa) and Chevron Corp (NYSE:CVX), as oil producers cut expenses to combat oil prices.
The John Crane unit, which contributed about 28 percent of the group's total revenue for the full year, reported a 10 percent fall in revenue excluding foreign exchange benefits.
Sales rose at Smiths' detection unit, which makes security sensors, and medical unit, which makes healthcare equipment, cushioning the impact from lagging sales at John Crane.
The company said it expected market conditions to remain unchanged next year.