Company Town : Arista Reports 2nd Strong Year, With ’94 Profit Up at Least 12% : Earnings: The German-owned label does not release specific figures, but it says it has done well with new acts.

For a label that recently had a hit single called “Mmm Mmm Mmm Mmm,” Arista Records is hardly at a loss for words when it comes to letting the world know how well it is doing.

Describing its 1994 performance as “phenomenal” and an “explosive streak,” the company said Monday that for the fiscal year ended June 30, it in effect matched the previous year’s strong sales figures of $250 million to $300 million, when the company had the top-selling “The Bodyguard” soundtrack.

Because Arista is owned by Bertelsmann Music Group of Germany, it does not release specific profit figures. But Clive Davis, Arista founder and president, said in an interview that year-to-year profit rose 12% to 15%, coming on top of the huge 70% jump in profit for fiscal ’93.

The ’94 results mark another strong year for the label in pop, black music and country.

Arista has been especially successful in breaking new acts, which tend to be more profitable than established stars, who can negotiate bigger advances and more lucrative deals for themselves.

Arista has done especially well with “The Sign,” the Ace of Base debut album that is on the way to becoming one of the year’s top sellers.

Arista officials said “The Sign” has sold more than 4.5 million copies domestically and some 10 million copies worldwide.

Other top-selling Arista artists include Toni Braxton--whose debut album on Arista’s LaFace label has sold 4 million copies--country stars Alan Jackson and Brooks & Dunn from its Nashville operation, and Crash Test Dummies of “Mmm Mmm Mmm Mmm” fame. Sales also continued to be strong over the year for Kenny G’s “Breathless” album and for Whitney Houston--whose songs made the “Bodyguard” soundtrack such a hit.

BMG Chairman Michael Dornemann said in a statement that he is elated with Arista’s performance, adding that its success extends into “every single international territory.”

However, industry executives note that the results also illustrate just how much BMG has come to depend on Arista, which accounts for most of its music business, and the way Arista outperformed other BMG units such as RCA.

“Arista is clearly the jewel in BMG’s crown,” one industry observer said.

The past two years’ results have also helped the company bury its most embarrassing scandal. It was embroiled in controversy in 1990 and 1991 when the members of its top-selling, Grammy-winning act Milli Vanilli admitted that they did not sing on their best-selling “Girl You Know It’s True.”

Davis said the past two years have been among the most satisfying for him in his lengthy music career.

Davis, who started Arista 19 years ago, headed Columbia Records in the late 1960s and early 1970s, signing groups that went on to become some of the top acts in rock.

“This is comparable to the period when I had Janis Joplin; Blood, Sweat & Tears; Chicago; Santana; Billy Joel, and Bruce Springsteen,” he said.