LONDON (Reuters) -BT, Britain’s biggest broadband and mobile company, reduced its full-year revenue forecast from broadly flat to down 1-2%, reflecting weaker demand in the corporate and public sectors, but kept its earnings and cash flow guidance unchanged.
The company on Thursday reported a 3% decline in revenue for the second quarter to 5.09 billion pounds ($6.59 billion), short of analyst forecasts of 5.22 billion pounds.
Adjusted earnings, however, met forecasts with a slight rise to 2.07 billion pounds.
Chief Executive Allison Kirkby said BT had ramped up its full fibre build and connections, improved customer satisfaction and continued to cut costs, contributing to growth in earnings and cash flow in the first half despite the revenue drop.
The company said it was seeing strong consumer demand for full-fibre, provided by its Openreach networks arm, with a record 446,000 net connections in the second quarter.
However, Openreach lost 377,00 lines in the first half, a 2% reduction in its base, driven by losses to competitors and a weaker overall broadband and new homes market.
$1 = 0.7729 pounds)
(Reporting by Paul Sandle; Editing by Catarina Demony and Kate Holton)
