By Maitane Sardon
Oshkosh Corp. on Wednesday posted a decline in revenue and better-than expected earnings for the first quarter.
The defense contractor reported net income of $69.5 million, or $1.01 a share, down from $75.7 million, or $1.10 a share, in the same period a year earlier. Analysts polled by FactSet were looking for $59 million, or $0.86 a share.
Oshkosh reported adjusted per-share earnings of $1.13. Analysts had expected $0.92 a share.
Sales came to $1.58 billion, down 7% from $1.7 billion last year and below the $1.95 billion forecast by analysts.
The company said the results included after-tax charges of $7.8 million, or $0.11 a diluted share, associated with restructuring actions in its Access Equipment segment and $0.6 million, or $0.01 per diluted share, associated with business acquisition costs in its Defense segment.
Wilson Jones, chief executive officer of Oshkosh, said the results exceeded the company's expectations as several of its key manufacturing sites are located in areas of the United States that suffered from very high rates of Covid-19 cases in 2020's fall.
"This caused high levels of absenteeism and brought challenges for many of our supply chain partners," Mr. Jones said.
Write to Maitane Sardon at maitane.sardon@wsj.com
