Swisscom results hurt by landline business falloff; early lease termination

Swisscom’s Italian subsidiary Fastweb helped ease the pain, but Switzerland’s biggest telco still experienced a 13 percent drop in profits—to $379 million—for the second quarter compared with last year's figures, due primarily to early termination of cross-border lease agreements.
Swisscom told a familiar tale: landline income was down, but was more than offset by an increase in wireless, broadband and television services. 

The company said second quarter revenues were up 12.5 percent to $2.81 billion and first six months revenues increased 17.6 percent to $5.5 billion, compared with last year's results.

Fastweb, which Swisscom acquired in 2007, continued to record strong revenue and customer growth in its broadband business in the first half of 2008. Fastweb is Italy's second-largest provider of broadband services.

For more:
- See this AP story at the International Herald Tribune
- And, this Dow Jones story at Total Teleco

Related articles:
Fastweb was a Fierce Top 10 Service Provider. Fastweb report
Swisscom saw Q1 profit drop. Swisscom report