SAN JOSE -- Sanmina reported fourth quarter revenue rose 6.9% from last year to $1.88 billion, at the high end of company guidance, driven by strong demand across majority of its end-markets.

Net income was $5.4 million.

Gross profit was up $1% to $129.7 million, and gross margin was 6.9%, up 50 basis points sequentially. Operating margin was 3.5%, up 50 basis points sequentially at the midpoint of the EMS company's outlook and flat with last year.

For its fiscal 2018 ended Sept. 30, revenue rose 3.5% year-over-year to $7.1 billion. The GAAP net loss was $91 million, down from net income of of $321 million in fiscal 2017, including a $161.1 million charge for income tax provision due to the US Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, restructuring charges, and a non-cash goodwill impairment charge recorded in the fourth quarter. Gross profit was down $55.3 million and gross margins were down 100 basis points.

For the quarter, the communications networks segment (36.8% of revenue) was up 2.6% sequentially and down 3.3% year-over-year. Industrial, automotive and defense (35.4% of revenue) was up 4.7% sequentially and up 10.2% over a year ago. Medical (17.9% of revenue) was up 11% sequentially and up 39.7% compared from 2017 year ago. Cloud solutions, including storage systems, gaming and set-top boxes, which is 9.9% of revenue, was down 8.4% sequentially and down 6% year-over-year.

The Components, Products and Services unit, which includes printed circuit board fabrication, backplane assemblies, cable assemblies, and closures, precision machining and plastic injection molding, was up 1.9% to $382 million with gross margin down 20 basis points sequentially to 8.2%. The improvement was largely due to the shutdown of production at Sanmina's Owego, NY, PCB plant in early July.

On a conference call, executive chairman Jure Sola said, "Sanmina has continued to see strong demand. Overall, our customer base is positive about the fiscal year 2018. Our company is focused on quality of the growth for fiscal year 2018 and beyond, and I can tell you that we are confident that fiscal year 2018 will be a lot better year.

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