TOKYO (AFP) - Japan's Sanyo Electric Co. Thursday reported a net loss of US$976 million for the past financial year due to falling sales and restructuring costs but said it expects to break even this year.

Sanyo - which is being bought by its bigger rival Panasonic Corp. - said net losses reached 93.23 billion yen in the 12 months to March, reversing the previous year's profit of 28.7 billion yen.

"The electronics industry fell into a serious sales slump due to curbs on corporate capital spending and rapidly worsened consumer spending," the company said in a statement.

"Sales plunged in the semiconductor and electronics parts segment" as demand and prices rapidly fell for cellphones, personal computers and television sets, it said.

Company president Seiichiro Sano said: "In the consumer product division, sales for almost all products fell in the year. Especially due to the decline in sales of automobiles in Europe, the revenue for in-car devices fell overseas.

"In the commercial division, poor sales of particularly large-size air conditioners significantly affected the performance."

Operating profit tumbled 89.1 percent to 8.28 billion yen as sales fell 12.2 percent to 1.77 trillion yen amid the global recession.

Sanyo expects no profit on a net basis for the current business year as the economic environment is likely to continue to be severe, it said.

But operating profit is forecast to rise to 25 billion yen, although sales are projected to fall 6.2 percent to 1.66 trillion yen.

Sanyo said he expects to see a "good synergy effect from the partnership with Panasonic in fiscal 2011."

He said the company will set a new goal to post an operating profit of 90 billion yen in the year to March 2012, in part by focusing on energy-efficient and environmentally friendly technologies.

"Towards a full recovery of the global economy, governments of many countries are planning a green new deal policy," he said.

"We want to prepare the company thoroughly so that we could make a solid profit when the policies start kicking off."