Two years after a fanfare opening, BenQ Australia has quit its Homebush Offices following a downturn in its business in Australia. Instead the company is moving to Norwest Business Park at Baulkham Hills.
Also quitting the company is long time marketing manager Margaret Raphael. The downsizing comes after BenQ worldwide boss K Y Lee officially opened the Homebush building promising at the time a major expansion of the companies R&D facilities in Australia.
However, Australia is not the only place where BenQ is quitting properties. The company, which has posted six consecutive quarterly losses, said that it would sell its camera business and that it was negotiating the sale of two office buildings in Taipei to help pay off debt.
Ability Enterprise will buy the digital camera business next month at book value, BenQ said. A company spokeswoman, Daisy Lee, said separately that the company was in talks with foreign and local bidders over the sale of two office buildings, including its headquarters in Taipei.
Losses at the company rose to a record level and interest expenses almost tripled last year, after the acquisition of Siemens’s unprofitable cellphone unit in 2005 failed to turn BenQ into a global brand.
Ability makes cameras for Casio Computer, Samsung Electronics and Nikon. Sales from BenQ’s Digital Media business, which includes cameras and overhead projectors, accounted for 20 percent of first-quarter revenue.
