3M breaks records once again in first quarter of 2014

3M has announced another quarter of record-breaking financial results for the first three months of 2014.

The company generated $7.8 billion (4.64 billion pounds) during the quarter, up by 2.6 percent year on year. Organic local-currency sales rose by 4.6 percent, while earnings per share were up by 11.2 percent to $1.79.

Its healthcare division saw the highest rate of growth of any of its business units at 4.8 percent in US dollar terms, with drug delivery, health information systems, food safety, critical and chronic care and infection prevention products seeing particularly strong performances.

The group maintained its full-year earnings expectation of $7.30 to $7.55 per share, with organic local-currency sales growth of between three and six percent.

Inge Thulin, 3M's chairman, president and chief executive officer, said: "3M is well positioned to generate sustainable, profitable growth far into the future."

This comes after the firm achieved a record-breaking sales total of $30.9 billion during the 2013 business year.