Imaging Device Maker Reports $196,000 Loss

New Image Industries Inc., a Canoga Park maker of computer imaging devices, said it lost $196,000 in the second quarter that ended Dec. 31, compared to a profit of $413,000 a year earlier. The company’s revenues for the period rose 32% to $4.27 million from $3.33 million a year before.

For the six months that ended Dec. 31, New Image reported a loss of $1.15 million, compared to a year-earlier profit of $642,000, as revenue increased 10% to $6.01 million from $5.45 million last year.

New Image’s products allow beauticians, dentists and others to show their customers what they would look like after a proposed hairstyling or dental work.

New Image attributed the losses to lower gross profit margins and higher overhead. The lower gross profit margins, the company said, are due to a “significant decline” in sales of higher-profit devices for use by hair stylists and an increase in sales of lower-profit devices for use by dentists.

New Image said it introduced a new hairstyle device in Europe during the second quarter, but did not report on its sales. New Image said last September that it would begin selling the device in the United States during the second quarter, but now says the device will not be marketed in this country until the fourth quarter.