Canton (Ohio) Repository: Diebold has its sights set on Western Europe to expand the company's ATM market in 2005.
Financial self-service, the ATM business, accounted for about 70 percent of Diebold's business through three quarters of 2004. Globally, the business gained market share for the fourth year in a row.
"We have a very, very strong U.S. market and good growth there," said Walden W. O'Dell, chairman and CEO. Diebold had an "outstanding" 2004 in Asia, while Latin America business was pretty good, he said.
But "we had a pretty tough year in Europe ... pretty flat, overall."
Diebold hopes that will change with the introduction of its Opteva ATM line in Europe. "We're getting final certifications (for Opteva) over the next few months in Western Europe. With our strong order input, strong backlog ... I'm highly confident that we're going to have a great 2005 in financial self-service," O'Dell said.
