Although the company said sales in the fourth quarter to the end of December 2003 had shrunk by 8% to 20.8m euros ($26.7m) compared to last year, its upbeat assessment of the year ahead pushed its stock price up 17% in trading on Monday.
CEO Jean-Yves Hardy, said that the company had landed its largest multi-year contract to build an offshore center for a major US client and it expects sales to grow organically at a higher rate than the market trend.
Valtech’s fourth quarter sees it emerge from a period of restructuring in which it cut 15% of its consulting headcount in France, and closed the largest of its three offices in Paris and its training business in the UK market.
Its positive mood contrasted sharply with the performance of its larger French competitors, GFI Informatique and Unilog, which both issued disappointing results last week. GFI reported sales down 10% at 500m euros ($639m) for the full year 2003, and Unilog’s annual sales dropped 3% to 593.1m euros ($758m).Transiciel which has been purchased by Cap Gemini Ernst & Young and is to be merged with its Sogeti unit, reported annual sales of 496m euros ($636m), down 12%.
While the French mid-market providers continue to struggle, Steria Group, a larger player, reported a 3% increase in fourth-quarter revenues to 283m euros ($363m). Its annual revenue slipped 1.6% to 970.5m euros ($1.25bn), though this was way below the annual target it had set itself in January of 1.13bn euros ($1.45bn).
Steria said the European IT services market had stabilized as of the end of the fourth quarter and had continued to be stable in the opening months of 2004. It said it expects a return to growth in the second half of 2004, in line with analysts’ forecasts of around 3% growth in the European market.
This article is based on material originally published by ComputerWire
