The Infrastructure & Systems business recorded revenue of 324 million euros, which shows a global increase of 7 % excluding PCs business, (an overall increase of 2%). This progress was driven by the very strong performance in the open servers segment (+25% in Unix, and +34% in Intel) and in the storage business (+53%). For its part, the proprietary systems business (GCOS) showed a decline, in line with the general industry trend.
Sales in the zone Asia, Africa, Eastern Europe achieved growth of 19%, with revenue of 116 million euros in the first half 2001. In the Americas Groupe Bull’s business activity was adversely affected by the slowdown in North America, as well as by the financial crisis in South America, and recorded a decline of 11% with revenue of 122 million euros.
The Integris IT services business (excluding maintenance) recorded revenue of 633 million euros, slowing down slightly (-3%). Integris enjoyed significant growth in several European countries, in particular in the United Kingdom, Spain and the Scandinavian countries. The services activities in the areas of I.T. consulting (+11%) and outsourcing (+9%) continued to progress. The repositioning currently underway of the services business towards growth segments of the market and the downturn in the telecommunications sector, led to a slowdown in the other services domains.
In spite of the slight slowdown in activity, the Groupe was able to maintain the level of its gross margin, and continuing major efforts to control costs enabled a significant reduction in general expenses (-16 million euros) as well as containment of R&D costs (-8 million euros).
Groupe Bull recorded a major improvement of 31 million euros in the EBIT, reflected across all the business activities. At end June the EBIT was -53 million euros, versus -84 million euros for the first half 2000.
In line with the decisions made at the end of fiscal year 2000, Groupe Bull has carried out several business activity disposals (the CP8 subsidiary specialising in Smart cards, and the Cara group subsidiary in Ireland, specialising in IT operations services).
The result recorded at end June 2001, after taking into account gains linked to these operations, as well as other financial items, stands at 126 million euros.
Also announced at the end of the year 2000, the headcount reduction plan (1,800 people) currently being carried out, was covered by a provision of 155 million euros made during the first half 2001.
After taking into account the provision for restructuring costs, Groupe Bull has recorded net income of -29 millions euros for the first half 2001.
The assets disposals and the improvement in trade working capital have enabled Groupe Bull to reduce its level of debt by over 50%. The debt has declined from 301 million euros at 1 January 2001 to 126 million euros at end June 2001, showing a decrease of 175 million euros, to be compared with an increase in debt of 239 million euros in the first half of 2000.
