Seoul, Apr 28 (IANS): LG Electronics on Thursday said its first-quarter operating profit rose more than 6 per cent from a year ago, fueled by sales of premium home appliances and one-off gains from patents licensing.

Its operating income came in at a quarterly record of $1.56 billion, marking a 6.4 percent year-on-year rise.

Sales increased 18.5 per cent to 21.1 trillion won in the January-March period, surpassing the market expectations and also marking the quarterly record for the company, reports Yonhap news agency.

Its home appliance division logged quarterly record sales of 7.97 trillion won, with an operating profit of 447 billion won.

Sales jumped 18.8 percent from a year ago, riding on the popularity of LG's high-end consumer products and new appliance categories, such as the LG Styler steam closet, the company said.

Its TV business earned 4.06 trillion won in sales and 188.4 billion won in operating profit, thanks to growing demand for premium OLED and large-screen TVs in Europe and North America, according to the company.

Its vehicle component solutions division also improved its performance, with sales rising 8.5 percent on-year, as its customers made "a preemptive response to the shortage of automotive semiconductors, LG said.

While the division is still making a loss, LG said the unit's first-quarter operating loss narrowed to 6.3 billion won.

While supply constraints are expected to gradually ease in the second half, the overall supply-demand imbalance of semiconductors will remain largely unresolved for some time, the company said.