Hexagon freezes Russian business, books charge

STOCKHOLM (Reuters) - Measurement technology group Hexagon AB said on Friday it was freezing its operations in Russia in the wake of Moscow's invasion of Ukraine and would book a one-off charge of 63 million euros ($70 million).

The Swedish company said in a statement the first-quarter charge was mainly related to the freezing of operations and included both balance sheet write-offs of assets and personnel costs.

"As previously communicated, Hexagon has already suspended all exports of hardware and software licenses to Russia and is now taking further steps to adapt to the current business situation," Hexagon said.

"Given the uncertainty of the outlook, these steps are constantly under review and will be adjusted if the situation changes."

Hexagon said it generated about 2 percent of annual turnover in Russia and employed around 200 people in the country.

Russia has described its actions in Ukraine as a "special military operation" to demilitarise and "denazify" Ukraine. Ukraine and Western allies call this a baseless pretext for Russia's invasion of a democratic country.

($1 = 0.9046 euros)

(Reporting by Niklas Pollard; Editing by Johan Ahlander)