Xerox

STAMFORD, Conn. - Xerox Corp. said General Electric Co.'s GE Capital agreed yesterday to take over its U.S. equipment-financing business and gave the largest copier company $1 billion in secured financing. Customer financing and administration operations will be run through a joint venture that will be 81 percent owned by GE Capital, Xerox said in a statement. The financing GE Capital agreed to provide is backed by U.S. lease receivables, Xerox said. Xerox had said earlier that it would switch to third-party financing to reduce debt by as much as $11 billion as part of a plan to return to profitability by year's end. Xerox leases 75 percent of the equipment it makes, and about 65 percent of the company's debt comes from its financing business.

STAMFORD, Conn. - Xerox Corp., the largest maker of copying machines, reported yesterday a drop in sales and profit in the second-quarter. The company said a slowing economy will probably delay a return to profitability to the fourth quarter. The company had a loss of $281 million, or 40 cents a share, compared with net income of $202 million, or 27 cents, in the second quarter last year. Sales fell 13 percent from $4.78 billion to $4.14 billion, the company said in a statement. It was the fourth quarterly loss in a row for Xerox.

STAMFORD, Conn. - Xerox Corp. shares fell 20 percent yesterday, dropping to the lowest level in more than 18 years, on concern that the cash crunch at the world's largest copier company may push it toward bankruptcy. The shares fell $1.25 to $5. That's the lowest since August 1982. The shares have dropped 78 percent since the start of the year, erasing about $12.8 billion from Xerox's market value. "It's apparent that the market is factoring in the fact that bankruptcy is in the realm of possibility," said Win Murray, an analyst with Boston-based Liberty Funds Group, which sold its Xerox shares several months ago. "Nobody is assuming that their underlying business is going to save them."

STAMFORD, Conn. - Xerox Corp. had its credit ratings on about $11 billion in debt cut to below-investment grade yesterday by Moody's Investors Service, a move that will heighten the cash crunch at the world's largest copier company. The company also announced 275 job cuts yesterday. The firings follow 350 administrative staff jobs cut last month. All of the recently announced job cuts are separate from the 5,200 layoffs that the company said in March would be carried out by April 2001.

STAMFORD, Conn. - Xerox Corp., whose chief executive was ousted last month after a failed reorganization, warned yesterday that second-quarter profit will be below forecasts because of slower sales of publishing equipment. The shares of the world's biggest copier-maker fell as much as 20 percent. It's the third profit warning in four quarters for Xerox, which has lost more than half its value in the past year. Xerox reorganized its sales force along product lines rather than geography last year, depressing sales and profit.

Axent Technologies Inc., which provides corporations with security systems for their electronic business and Internet networks, said yesterday that it signed its biggest contract ever, a $20 million deal with Xerox in Europe. John Becker, president and chief executive officer, said the five-year deal involves installing a range of Axent products to prevent and detect hackers attempting to enter or disrupt networks that Xerox plans for new e-commerce initiatives and its mobile sales force.

STAMFORD, Conn. -- Xerox Corp., the world's No. 1 copier company, plans to announce this week that it will cut at least 2,500 jobs to reduce costs and take a pretax, first-quarter charge of as much as $700 million, analysts said yesterday. The company is likely to cut between 2,500 and 5,000 jobs, analysts said. Xerox has said the cuts will be fewer than the 10,000 eliminated in a 1998 restructuring program. The company is likely to contract out some manufacturing, notably for the housings of some printers and copiers, analysts said.

STAMFORD, Conn. -- Xerox Corp. said yesterday that it will sell its Crum & Forster Holdings Inc. subsidiary to Fairfax Financial Holdings Ltd. for $680 million, completing its five-year exit from the financial services industry.Fairfax, a Toronto insurance and investment management company, will pay Xerox $565 million in cash for the commercial property and casualty insurer and assume $115 million of its debt.The purchase is the latest by Fairfax Chairman Prem Watsa, who has built a reputation for buying and turning around insurers.

STAMFORD, Conn. -- Xerox Corp. agreed yesterday to sell its insurance unit to Kohlberg Kravis Roberts & Co. for $2.72 billion as it ends its money-losing foray into financial services.Xerox will take a $1.5 billion charge in the 1995 fourth quarter to sell Talegen Holdings Inc. to KKR, a buyout firm. The sale will result in a loss in the quarter for Xerox, which reported year-earlier earnings of $236 million, or $2.07 a share.The company also agreed to sell its money-management group and Talegen subsidiary, First Quadrant Corp.

Education Alternatives Inc., the company managing nine Baltimore schools, has named a Xerox Corp. executive to oversee its Baltimore operations, which are under intense political fire and orders from Mayor Kurt L. Schmoke to improve student performance.Ramon Harris, district controller and business manager for the Philadelphia and McLean, Va., offices of Xerox, replaces Philip E. Geiger as divisional president for Maryland.Dr. Geiger, a former schools superintendent in New Jersey, had been reassigned after a year on the job. Test scores in the Tesseract schools did not improve, and some principals said he spent too little time in Baltimore and was demanding more than the schools could deliver.