3M’s strong sales of safety and security products offset a declin...

as revenue from display and graphics products, including optical film, increased to $1 billion from $913 million. 3M’s electro and communications segment overcame what Chief Financial Officer Patrick Campbell called a “sluggish CE market” to record a gain in sales to $693 million from $670 million. 3M markets a range of CE components including interconnects and EMI absorber, the latter being used in digital cameras and mobile phones to suppress radiated noise from electrical devices. A 10 percent sales decline in 3M’s interconnect business was offset by double-digit gains in electrical and communications products, Campbell said. The CE market for 3M’s products was “soft” during the quarter as customers worked off inventory, he said. 3M started production in April at a new optical film convertor plant in Poland that’s designed to service the LCD TV market in Europe. Sharp and LG.Philips LCD have assembly plants near the facility, company officials said. The plant, which reportedly cost $50 million to build and employs 100 workers, processes film produced at 3M plants in Alabama and Wisconsin. At the plants, the key has been to keep yields above price declines. The U.S. factories, which typically had 50 percent yields, benefitted from recycling materials, rather then dumping them in a land fill, CEO George Buckley said. Operating income in display and graphics increased to $352 million from $288 million a year ago, while those in electro and communications were flat at $132 million.