Vienna, 15 February 2010 - After a solid third quarter in 2009, which nevertheless still demonstrated a fall in turnover of 2% compared to the previous year, the technical consumer goods market has now emerged into the plus zone: the brighter trend has continued in the fourth quarter with an increase of just 1% over the comparable period in the previous year. Above all, it was the extremely positive results for major domestic appliances – dominated by the trend towards increased energy efficiency – which gave the market a clear upwards momentum as the year came to a close.

The consumer electronics sector also profited from welcome developments in various product segments such as LCD-TVs, Blu-ray-Players and HD-Receivers and was therefore able to take further steps on the road to recovery after a difficult first half year. The small domestic appliances have continued their positive development, even though a slight fall away in the dynamics could be identified in the fourth quarter. The weak performances in the Information Technology and Office Hardware sectors remained unchanged.