These half-year figures from Hull-based telecoms group KCOM (KCOM) revealed a fairly soft overall performance, but the group did make progress on a several fronts - including further deployment of fibre and an increasing uptake of fibre-based services.
The KC unit, which offers telephony and broadband services in Hull and East Yorkshire area, saw more customers taking up bundled products - this helped to push divisional cash profits up by about 1 per cent year on year to £28.1m, despite a modest fall in divisional revenues. Investment, especially in fibre, remains substantial - £13.5m was spent in the first half alone - but the company should reap longer-term benefits form this spend going forward. The KCOM division, meanwhile - which focuses on business communications - also saw revenues slip slightly, despite a number of key customer wins and a rising order backlog. It's still feeling the pinch from a lacklustre UK economy and divisional cash profits dropped 4 per cent in the period to £13.9m.