Stanley Bergman
Analyst · Goldman Sachs.
Yes, very hard to give precise predictions here. The order book in the U.S. seems to be reasonably solid. It's ahead of last year, precise number, I think, we don't really provide but it is ahead of last year and as even taking into account that last year we did, I believe, have more BIOLASE orders in the order book so -- and the movement I think a way from the high end of the 3D X-ray to the more medium view. So I think we can say that in the U.S., it's quite solid, similar trends in Canada, so North America overall. In Europe, obviously, there was a significant increase in orders in Germany as a result of the IDS. Having said that, our German business seems to be quite solid still on the equipment side. Very hard to gauge France right now because this is really the quiet period, so the base is a very low number at this time. I think we'll be okay in France and Italy, the U.K., it's not material but the order book is down. The U.K. economy is not doing well but again, it's not material from an equipment point of view in U.K. Our animal health business, by the way, seems to be doing very well in the U.K., and the consumable business, although the market is challenged in the U.K., seems to be quite solid. So that covers the major markets in Europe. Australia, as I think we've indicated in the past, we believe the equipment business was fueled, to a large extent, by the stimulus package and we have seen in the first 2 months, somewhat of a reduction in sales of equipment in Australia in particular. And although we don't think it's going to be quite as bad for the remainder of the year, we're not very enthusiastic about equipment growth in Australia. On balance, we think the international equipment business will continue to show growth this year and the market in Germany, by the way, even though the IDS is behind us, it still seems to be a relatively stable to growing market. So we may not see exactly this growth on the equipment side, but I think you can expect to see good growth on the equipment side in Europe, and perhaps even a little bit better in North America. But we don't believe we're going back and we don't believe we are going significantly forward.