Morning:
14°c
O2 is staying on the right lines
Nick Goodway14.05.08
Britain's biggest mobile phone company, Telefonica-owned O2, outperformed its rivals in the first quarter and said it had seen no significant drop in customer spending or usage despite the High Street slowdown.
Chief executive Matthew Key said the group was monitoring the situation closely, but added: "Part of our success has been anticipating customer needs and delivering customers value - like our Simplicity tariff in the UK, which offers flexibility at our lowest monthly rate, which is very attractive in the current economic climate."
Launched last summer the simplicity tariff is O2's best seller online and will shortly exceed 500,000 customers.
Like-for-like revenues for the group, which includes Germany, the Czech Republic and Ireland, rose 6.4% and operating income was up 5.5% in the first three months of 2007.
UK revenues grew 12.6%. O2 added 206,000 contract customers but shed 185,000 pre-pay customers.
