UPDATE 1-GN profit below consensus, Netcom CEO won't be back

* Q4 oper profit 27 mln crowns vs poll 35 mln

* Will not renew unit CEO's contract

* Says not building up for potential upswing after recession

* Shares down 2.8 pct in early trading

(Adds details, quotes)

COPENHAGEN, Feb 27 (Reuters) - Danish hearing aid and headset maker GN Store Nord (GN.CO) posted fourth quarter operating profit slightly below consensus on Friday and said it would not renew the contract of its Netcom chief executive.

The company reported operating profit of 27 million Danish crowns ($4.61 million) compared to 35 million in a Reuters poll of analysts and 5 million in the year ago period.

GN said this year's operating profit would be in line with that of 2008.

The company expects headset unit Netcom to post an operating loss of 100 million crowns this year as sales drop 17 percent to 2 billion crowns.

"Netcom will have a lot of one-offs, without those it would be profitable," said Jens Bille Bergholdt, vice president for investor relations at GN.

He declined to say whether that meant Netcom would make a profit in 2010, saying only that its mobile bluetooth headset subdivison was expected to break even by the end of 2009, with the office headset subdivision "improving some".

Bergholdt said the company was not positioning itself for growth after the recession.

"We're not building up for a potential upswing. We're just preparing for a tough market," he said.

GN has been struggling to turn its business around since German competition authorities blocked the sale of its ReSound hearing aid unit to Switzerland's Sonova SOON.S in 2007 for $2.8 billion. The total market value of the entire company is just 2.3 billion crowns now.

While ReSound has continued to make money, Netcom is struggling with losses on its sleek Jabra bluetooth headsets and has announced several rounds of cost cuts.

Bergholdt declined to say whether Netcom's difficulties were the reason for not renewing chief executive Toon Bouten's contract.