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The London-based company, which is 50 percent owned by Tony O'Reilly's Independent News and Media, said that revenues for the nine months to 30 September 2001 were STG10 million, 344 percent up compared to the first nine months of 2000. For the third quarter of 2001 alone, the company raked in STG4.0 million, a jump of 20 percent from the previous quarter.
Broken down into specific business areas, IVR (interactive voice response) revenues for iTouch increased 87 percent to STG2.6 million, while SMS revenues from the company's 624 corporate SMS customers were up over fourteen-fold to STG4.7 million. Other revenues were STG2.7 million, up nearly 400 percent.
ITouch, which operates in the UK, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, Indonesia, Thailand, Israel, Greece and Ireland, said its gross profit in the first nine months was STG5.5 million and the gross margin was 55 percent.
The company's massive jump in revenues also comes with heightened losses as the firm's operations expand. The company's losses before amortisation, depreciation and share incentive scheme charges were STG7.5 million in the first nine months, up STG1.0 million in the same period a year ago. The firm's loss after interest, depreciation, amortisation, tax and other exceptional charges and write-offs came to STG12.2 million. STG2.6 million of this loss came in Q3 2001. This compares with a loss on ordinary activities of STG9.9 million in the first nine months of 2000.
The basic loss per share for the nine month period was STG0.042 and the adjusted loss per share was STG0.021.
"We have had another good quarter, with revenues ahead of target for the fifth consecutive quarter," said Ivan Fallon, chairman of iTouch. "Cash outflow was only STG3.1 million in the quarter, including the impact of the Telequity acquisition, and we ended the period with net cash of STG41.1 million." He went on to say that the company expected to see higher revenues in Q4 following the acquisition of Thus plc's voice business, and the company is "moving steadily" towards profitability.
In the company's stated outlook, it said it expected growth in the next quarter and in next year, but admitted that the market in general was "difficult."
All of this growth in the face of a weakening economy, especially in the communications sector, can be attributed in part to iTouch's succession of acquisitions in the past 12 months. This time last year the firm bought the New Zealand mobile office applications developer Holliday in a STG7.4 million deal. That was followed by its purchase of Telequity in Australia for AUS2.6 million and its most recent acquisition of the branded and media sales elements of Thus plc in the UK. The Thus deal was worth STG3.5 million in cash.
The consequences of this rapid growth remain unclear but ITouch's financial figures indicate that the company is coping with the growth well. It continues to keep cash outflow under control and has not announced any major rounds of job cuts in the year. Total headcount at the end of September stood at 407, up from 313 at 30 June 2001 largely reflecting the Telequity acquisition.
In the Irish market iTouch's revenues were up five percent on quarter two 2001 and up 24 percent on quarter three 2000. Nevertheless the firm said its third quarter Smart Messaging revenues were down, while Q3 IVR revenues were up significantly. The company also said it had 29 corporate SMS customers at the quarter's end including Bank of Ireland and the Office of Public Works.
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