Full steam ahead at Inmarsat

By John Hughman, 07 August 2009

The successful commercial launch of a third Inmarsat-4 satellite in January laid the foundation for solid results from the satellite communications group, with Inmarsat able to offer full global coverage for the first time.

Underlying sales in the core Inmarsat business climbed 8 per cent to $337m (£200m), driven by strong demand for its new maritime voice and data services, Fleet and FleetBroadband. Revenues in the maritime business climbed 5.2 per cent to $177m, although this was held back by changes to the phasing of volume discounts. Chairman and chief executive Andrew Sukawaty says that on a normalised basis, maritime sales growth would have been nearer 10 per cent. Data remained the key engine of growth, though, thanks to increased government usage in the Indian Ocean and what Mr Sukawaty describes as rising "social access to crews as a retention staff".

The land mobile business did less well, as troop withdrawals from Iraq hit traffic levels, but Mr Sukawaty is confident on long-term prospects despite volatility caused by what he describes as "constant changes in the status of operations". Meanwhile, the smaller aeronautical business saw sales climb by a quarter to $35.5m as more aircraft were fitted with its Swift 64 in-flight broadband terminals. Inmarsat also exercised its option to buy distribution business Stratos in April.

Analysts expect full-year adjusted pre-tax profits of $230m and EPS of 35¢ ($182m and 27¢, respectively, in 2008).

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