Sigma-Aldrich hails successful fourth quarter of 2013

Sigma-Aldrich has announced its financial results for the fourth quarter of 2013, during which it generated sales of $684 million (417.04 million pounds).

This represents a five percent operational revenue increase year on year and marks a new quarterly record for the company. For the full year, the firm's sales rose by three percent to $2.7 billion.

At the start of 2013, Sigma-Aldrich began operating through three distinct customer-facing business units – research, applied and SAFC Commercial – with each of them performing strongly across the year as a whole.

In 2014, overall organic sales growth for the full year is expected to come in the low-to-mid single digits, representing a slight improvement over its strong 2013.

President and chief executive officer Rakesh Sachdev said: "Our teams had a successful, productive year, which resulted in record sales, earnings and free cash flow for Sigma-Aldrich, and we delivered solid earnings per share growth for the 39th consecutive year."

This comes after the firm announced last month that it has been named in Corporate Knights' annual list of the Global 100 Most Sustainable Corporations in the World.