Phoenix IT Group upbeat

Profits 'comfortably in line with expectations'

Phoenix IT Group's recovery under new broom Steve Vaughan appears to be on course as the infrastructure services outfit issued an upbeat trading update.

The London-listed outfit confirmed this morning that it expects profits for its fiscal 2015 to be comfortably in line with market expectations.

According to market watcher Megabuyte, analysts expect Phoenix to see EBTIDA fall from £30.5m to £27m on revenues down seven per cent to £218m for its fiscal year that ended 31 March 2015.

"During the past six months, the group has seen good trading across the business," Phoenix said.

"The group therefore continues to expect to report profits that are comfortably in line with market expectations. Once again strong progress has been made in reducing the net debt position, which stood at £49.0m at the year end (2014: £56.1m), ahead of the board's expectations."

Phoenix is now moving into 'phase two' of its recovery under Vaughan, who swiftly ruled out a sale or breakup of the firm after being appointed chief executive last March following a tumultuous few years for the business continuity, managed services and channel services specialist.

This mainly comprises boosting cross-selling between cloud and business continuity, and Phoenix held up a recent win with Aggreko as evidence of its traction in this area.

Phoenix also recently bagged a three-year infrastructure services renewal deal with Costain Group, a client it has held since 1999. Meanwhile, the number of customers for its CloudSure UK public cloud offering has doubled to 12 over the past six months, it said.