Atlantic Telecom Group Plc has seen double benefit this year from the sale of its loss-making Coventry Cable Ltd, with operating losses down and profits boosted by the one-off gain. The cable and wireless telephony company, formerly Caledonian Media Communications Plc, saw profits boosted to 300,000 pounds by the 541,000 pounds net gain from the sale, against losses last time of 397,000 pounds, on revenue down 18% to 4m pounds. Atlantic Telecom raised 23.2m pounds in a share placing and open offer at the end of last year (CI No 3,014), and subsidiary Atlantic Telecommunications Ltd launched its fixed link radio access telephone system in Glasgow (CI No 3,028). As at December 31, the company had some 1,590 installed and pending installations, 1,118 residential and 472 business lines, which it says is more than double its expectations. The group’s broadband cable television operation in Aberdeen continues to perform well, it said, and the churn rate, or number of subscribers lost, is lower than the industry norm, Atlantic said. It has increased prices in line with offering new services and increased charges from programmers, but has also increased the number of channels to 41. The narrowband company, Broadcast Satellite Television Ltd, is declining as expected, with subscribers down to 10,518 at the end of December from 13,916 at the end of September 1995. The company says it has taken steps to reduce its administration costs. In September, the company acquired Logicall Telecommunications Ltd, a telephone aggregation company, which it says is already performing well. In line with standard accounting practices, all the group’s operating costs were capitalized up to the launch of the commercial wireless service on October 30, and from that date costs are being expensed. Chairman Graham Duncan says this will have a significant adverse affect on the results for the second half and will continue for some time thereafter as is to be expected of any telecommunications start-up phase.
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