Hitachi, Toshiba beat own forecasts: report

TOKYO (Reuters) - Hitachi Ltd (6501.T) and Toshiba Corp (6502.T) have likely beat their own earnings outlook for the year just ended due to brisk demand for digital electronics and power plants in emerging markets, the Nikkei business daily said.

Operating profit at Hitachi has likely exceeded 160 billion yen ($1.7 billion) in the year ended March 31 thanks to growing orders for railway and power generation systems, and strong sales of flat televisions, the Nikkei said on Saturday.

That compares with the company's own operating profit forecast of 135 billion yen and the consensus of a 143.9 billion yen profit in a poll of 18 analysts by Thomson Reuters I/B/E/S.

Toshiba has likely beat its own operating profit forecast of 100 billion yen for the previous business year by about 10 billion yen as its flash memory chips, used in digital cameras and smartphones, met robust demand, the Nikkei said.

Analysts on average expect Toshiba to post an operating profit of 105.1 billion yen for the 2009/10 financial year.

Behind Samsung Electronics Co Ltd (005930.KS), Toshiba is the world's second-largest maker of NAND flash memory chips, which can retain data even after electricity is turned off, making them an ideal storage device for portable electronics.

No officials at Hitachi or Toshiba were immediately available for comment.

Toshiba is set to announce full-year earnings results on May 7, followed by Hitachi, Japan's biggest electronics conglomerate, on May 11.

(Reporting by Kiyoshi Takenaka; Editing by Jeremy Laurence)