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The Irish Independent reports that the Catholic Church has rejected a multi-million euro offer from KTI International, a telecoms company who sought to install mobile phone masts in church spires. The Dublin diocese said it rejected the deal due to potential health risks. The offer from KTI could have earned each of the city's 200 individual parishes more than EUR50,000 a year.
The paper also says that the Small Firms Association has launched a special guide for small businesses on getting value from information technology investments.
The Irish Times reports that troubled Deutsche Telekom chief executive Ron Sommer has resigned after weeks of speculation. Telekom's supervisory board appointed Professor Helmut Sihler, a former board member, to serve as chief executive for six months and find a permanent successor. Sihler did not rule out that Gerd Tenzer, head of the firm's networks division, would succeed him at the debt-laden company. Telekom shares rose 14 percent on the Frankfurt stock exchange following the news, before closing up 4 percent at EUR10.98.
The same paper says that Irish telecoms firm Nevada tele.com has sought new funding options following recent financial problems at Energis, the British firm that owns a 50 percent stake in the company. The disclosure by Nevada management followed an Energis announcement that it would sell its British business to a new firm called Chelys, run by its banks. Energis's Dutch operation will also be sold, and the future of the group's Irish and Polish joint ventures remains unclear. Nevada chief executive Les Harris confirmed that the firm had investigated methods of recapitalisation recently and was looking at all options open to the company.
According to the Irish Examiner, the FTSE 100 ended another volatile session above the 4000 barrier on Tuesday. The London index was 134 points down at 3860 by mid-morning, due to a sharper-than-expected fall in UK inflation and fears that Wall Street shares would slide. Later, London and New York stocks rallied, boosted by upbeat comments from Federal Reserve chairman Alan Greenspan. Vodafone was up STG0.05 to 91p, and mmO2 was ahead STG0.02 to STG0.44. The FTSE closed up 27.4 points at 4021.9.
The Financial Times says that Motorola has reported its largest-ever loss of USD2.3 billion for the second quarter, amid a spate of restructuring charges totalling USD3.4 billion. The charges, which had been announced at the end of June, follow an aggressive period of restructuring at the troubled telecoms and semiconductor group over the last year. Last month, the company said it was laying off a further 7,000 workers. In spite of the losses, however, Motorola beat analysts' forecasts for the second quarter and said it had returned to profitability excluding the impact of the special items.
According to the Wall Street Journal, RealNetworks narrowed its second-quarter net loss as it reported a fall in revenue of 8.6 percent. The multimedia company reported a net loss of USD1.6 million, or USD0.01 a share, compared with a loss of USD19.2 million, or USD0.12 a share, a year ago. The narrowed loss was largely the result of an accounting change that eliminated goodwill-amortisation expenses from the second-quarter results. The company reported revenue of USD43.8 million, down from USD47.9 million a year earlier. The result was consistent with a forecast RealNetworks made in June.
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