Computacenter making 'steady' progress

Firm releases pre-close trading update for first six months of 2006

Services and infrastructure giant Computacenter has claimed the first half of 2006 has been a period of “steady progress”.

In an pre-close trading update for the first six-months of the year - released today - the firm said its UK technology solutions saw ‘strong growth’ on the back of a number of projects, and its managed and support services achieved ‘modest growth’ in comparison.

On the product side of the UK business, the statement said, improved margins have ‘more than compensated’ for a decline in revenues. This is attributed to a ‘more favourable’ mix of business, including increased datacentre spend, strong demand from the financial services sector and a decline in low margin trade distribution sales.

In addition Computacenter Germany is expected to report a ‘small profit’ for the first six months – after securing some ‘substantial’ managed services wins in the region.

Computacenter France experienced ‘good revenue growth’ which the firm said should ‘assist in reducing the scale of the losses’ in the first half. However the French market has suffered from strong margin pressure.

The firm will report its full interim half year results on 12 September 2006.