NSK Ltd., Japan's largest bearing manufacturer, is officially projecting sales and profits for the first half of 2002, ending September 30.

Sales are forecast to come in 1% over 2001, at ¥ 255 billion (USD $2.2 billion). On that modest sales gain, however, the company said profits should jump more than 12%, to ¥ 5.5 billion ($ 46.6 million).

NSK indicated most of the sales improvements were spotty, with the strongest growth coming in a few market segments such as automotive. Bearing sales to Japanese domestic appliance manufacturers also picked up, as have non-automotive bearing sales into North America.

Last week, NSK's shares jumped 4% in one day as rumors of a sales and profitability rebound began to circulate.

NSK is in the midst of a long-term, worldwide restructuring effort; the company indicated that most of the first half 2002 profitability improvement stems from those restructuring initiatives.