Public sector orders helps KCOM make progress

KCOM Group today said it was making progress despite continued challenging markets.

The Hull-based quoted telecoms group said that it sees the public sector as an “important opportunity for growth” and it has recently secured a number of key contract renewals.

In an interim management statement for its third quarter to December 31, executive chairman Bill Halbert said: “Market conditions continue to be challenging. The group has however continued to exploit successfully the opportunities that are there, with positive momentum across all brands. We remain confident about the quality of our business operations and their capacity to generate cash and reconfirm our commitment to a minimum ten per cent growth in the dividend in this financial year.” 
 
Kcom was named as the preferred bidder by East Sussex County Council to provide a hosted managed communications service on behalf of a range of public sector organisations as part of the Link Consortium arrangement

Its Smart421 and Eclipse businesses continued to perform well with Smart winning a services and support contract with National Rail Enquiries.
 
The KC part of the group, which operates telephony and broadband over the group\’s East Yorkshire network and provides publishing services, continued to make a strong contribution to the quarter\’s performance and the next phase of its fibre deployment has begun in business parks and residential areas.

KC is on target to start connecting customers in premises passed by this second phase over the coming months.