NetServices share price takes an early bath

Reviving the 10 per cent club?

By Lucy Sherriff • Get more from this author

Posted in Networks, 5th September 2006 13:13 GMT

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NetServices has seen its share price tumble after it warned that full-year losses would be higher than expected.

It was the second profits warning the company has issued since it floated back in March. The 8.5p shares are now worth just 10 per cent of their highest value.

Despite this apparently gloomy situation, company spokeswoman Maria Goggin insisted that NetServices was on track.

"Our strategy has always been to move away from the broadband side of things," she told us. "We have a range of other services - wide area networking, hosting and a voice offering, that we are focused on instead. That has always been our strategy."

She couldn't say how much of the company's revenue came from these other offerings.

Goggin denied reports that the company was planning to sell its wholesale broadband operation, and tried to allay concerns that it had been caught napping by "free" broadband offerings from the likes of Carphone Warehouse and Sky, saying the market had moved a lot for everyone in the last year:

"We were caught off guard as much as anyone was," she said.

She argued that the "hype" around so-called free broadband packages will start to calm down in the next couple of months.

"People are savvy to this not really being free, and just included in the price," she told us.

The ISP was founded in 1996, and had a turnover of £17m before it floated on AIM back in March.®

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