GE Oil & Gas, a unit of General Electric Co., had a rough 2016 as the worldwide oil glut continued to depress prices and profits. But the GE Oil & Gas unit recorded an uptick in digital orders, GE chairman and CEO Jeff Immelt told analysts on the company’s year-end earnings call Friday.
“Oil & Gas orders grew by 2% organically, our first growth in two years,” Immelt told analysts, according to a transcript of the call from Seeking Alpha. Oil & Gas segment equipment orders “grew by 10% with services down slightly,” he said. “And for the year, Oil & Gas digital orders grew by 30%.”
Oil & Gas unit digital orders include equipment, software and services. GE did not break out dollar amounts for online orders, but did report total revenue for the segment of $12.89 billion for fiscal 2016, down 22% from $16.45 billion in the previous year. Q4 Oil & Gas sales also declined 22%, to $3.40 billion from $4.35 billion in the same quarter last year.
In July 2015 GE Oil & Gas launched a new e-commerce platform that aimed to increase the amount of orders its customers place online. It was designed to help GE’s globally dispersed customers find the right product information and place orders at any time without assistance from customer service reps, a GE spokeswoman said in late 2015. At the same time, the new site enabled GE to more accurately display product information and pricing, with an eye on improving its profit margins.
In addition to oil and gas, GE’s industrial business segment includes power, aviation, healthcare and transportation.
For the year ended Dec. 31, GE, No. 6 in the 2017 B2B E-Commerce 300, reported for its industrial segment:
- Total revenue of $113.15 billion, up 4% from $108.79 billion in fiscal 2015.
- Net income of $17.598 billion, down 2.0% from $17.966 billion in the same period last year.
For the fourth quarter ended Dec. 31, GE reported for its industrial segment:
- Total revenue of $31.236 billion, down 0.03% I GET 0.36% $31.352 billion in the prior year quarter.
- Net income of $5.84 billion, up 5.8% from $5.52 billion in Q4 2015.
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