Brentford, UK-based Morse, which is Europe’s largest server reseller, made an operating profit before goodwill amortization for the six months ended December 31 2002 of 5m pounds ($7.75m), including restructuring costs of 1m pounds ($1.55m) for its German operation. Revenue for the period fell 18% to 185m pounds ($286.8m) largely as a result of the slump in infrastructure sales, which fell 27% to 128m pounds ($198.4m). However, revenue from related IT services grew 12% to 57m pounds ($88.4m), and now accounts for 31% of Morse’s revenue.
During the second quarter, revenue fell 25% to 92m pounds ($142.6m), including a 31% decline in infrastructure sales to 60m pounds ($93m), although that was partly offset by a 14% increase in services revenue to 32m pounds ($49.6m).
CEO Duncan McIntyre said: We are continuing to see demand for our services as clients look to make the most of their existing infrastructure whilst controlling tightly their overall spend…The infrastructure business remains well placed to benefit from any increased activity from the current low level in the financial and telecommunications markets, albeit that we don’t anticipate an improvement in these sectors in the near future.
Source: Computerwire
