Computacenter margins rise but sales fall

IT supplier Computacenter (CC) said revenues fell 8%, but profits were ahead of expectations in a trading update for the first six months of 2009,

However, the IT integrator said reductions to customer budgets meant product sales and professional services sales were down.

"The trading environment remains very challenging and neither Computacenter nor its customers are immune," said chief executive Mike Norris.

"It is therefore no surprise that our product sales are down in the period. However steps that we have taken to reduce our costs and win new service contracts have meant that we are able to deliver another strong profit performance."

Computacenter restructured and made a number of redundancies resulting in a one off exceptional charge of circa £5m for the year, but it said today it has "realised the majority" of planned cost reductions in the UK.

This story originally appeared on Microscope.co.uk