| Tue 5 Mar 2002, 0:00 | | Dimension Data Holdings plc-Pre-close period tradi |
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5 March 2002
In line with Dimension Data Holdings plc's intention to communicate the
Group's progress and performance through more regular market updates, the
Group announces the following communications schedule for the financial year
ending September 2002:
Interims pre-close briefing 5 March 2002
Annual General Meeting 10 April 2002
Results announcement for six months to March 2002 15 May 2002
Finals pre-close briefing 6 September 2002
Results announcement for year ending September 2002 20 November 2002
Today's pre-close briefing for analysts and investors will take the form of
presentations from Jeremy Ord, Executive Chairman, Malcolm Rutherford,
Financial Director, and members of the senior management team. These
presentations will deal with progress made in implementing the Group's
strategy, regional updates and an update on current business conditions. A
summary of the financial aspects of today's presentation follows:
Trading in the first half of the year has been against the backdrop of
continued difficult market conditions. The Group has managed its cost base
during the period whilst continuing to invest in transitioning its business
model to one of principally delivering services and solutions.
For the first six months of the current financial year, we expect:
* Excluding the effects of currency, turnover to be flat sequentially and
in line with our budget. We expect an adverse currency impact of
approximately 5%.
* Overheads will be within previous guidance.
* Gross margins will be approximately 0.5% below previous guidance due to
lower than anticipated business levels in our e-business and contact centre
agency divisions, and pricing pressure in certain regions.
In this first half, trading was impacted by the slowdown in Asia and the US.
More recently, trading has stabilised and in terms of outlook, our back
orders and prospects are currently better than they were at the end of the
last financial year. We expect this to translate into revenue growth in the
second half of the year. Given the higher levels of services and `new
technology' revenues in these orders and prospects, gross margins are likely
to remain at a similar level to the first half of the year. Full year
overheads, which include a significant investment in developing new lines of
business, will be within previous guidance of $460m.
Jeremy Ord, Executive Chairman, said: "We continue to make progress with
our stated strategy of globalising our services and solutions based model.
This approach has been endorsed by significant customer wins in each of our
regions that clearly demonstrate our ability to provide a unique and
compelling blend of services and technology. Encouragingly, these contracts
are long term and provide us with a platform to sell further services within
these clients."
Slides of the presentation as well as an audio playback facility will be
available on the Dimension Data website (www.didata.com).
For further information, please contact:
Karen Cramer, Investor Relations
Dimension Data Holdings plc 020 7651 7000
Giles Sanderson / James Melville-Ross
Financial Dynamics 020 7831 3113
Dimension Data Holdings plc
Dimension Data Holdings plc (LSE:DDT) is a leading global technology
services company, which specialises in providing and managing collaborative
infrastructure solutions that enable businesses to communicate and transact
internally and externally.
Dimension Data, founded in 1983, had revenues of $2.5 billion in 2001 and
operates in over 30 countries. The company's global presence, combined with
its expertise in managed services, network infrastructure, application
integration and e-business services, enables it to provide specialist
solutions to help its customers become fully integrated and connected
companies.
