Gerard Kleisterlee
Analyst · incandescent in certain geographical areas. Is this an ongoing effect or would you call this a special case of restocking if those were the two things
I think you have described the situation pretty well. I will just qualify a little bit your statement on the medical. Actually, on medical the incoming orders were a negative 6% which in relative terms is a pretty different number from the one we had in the previous quarters. So it's still negative, of course, in that fourth quarter incoming orders for US equipment, but it is, of course, a bit of a different base versus the 20 plus negative growth that we had had in the previous quarters. Now, in lighting, I think you've commented on it. Yes, Prof Lum for the reasons we described, as far as lifestyle is concerned, consumer sentiment in North America, obviously, being a little bit different from the one we've seen in Europe, okay sales over the Christmas period, and in terms of visibility, difficult to say much more. The one sector that basically breached with one of the questions raised before in this call, we believe that when there is going to be some, I would say, end put to the uncertainty on the healthcare market. Our belief is that at that particular point of time, almost regardless of the results of the reform, we believe that the end of uncertainty could bring some tailwind to our healthcare business, I think at least that's the way we see that today. We believe that the uncertainty today is probably what is becoming the worst element to deal with that in that particular activity in North America. Other sectors, no real visibility, no real uptick on commercial constructions and leases and not much to say beyond what we've already put in the release. Now, to your question on home healthcare, basically Respironics did well in the fourth quarter, and let me give you a few figures. Respironics was actually was up 11% in terms of revenue in that fourth quarter. And that is obviously very encouraging news because this is basically on the back of the beginning of the impact of the new product portfolio which was introduced just a few weeks ago, so clearly we're getting some traction there and it is starting to show in the numbers.