Ulster TV announces 46% hike in annual profits

Broadcaster Ulster TV said today an advertising upturn had helped it to boost annual profits by 46% to £13.9m (€20.2m).

UTV, which broadcasts TV and radio and supplies internet and telecoms services across Ireland, said television advertising revenues rose by 16% in the year to December 31 against 2.6% for ITV1 as a whole, while radio advertising grew 8%.

It said the TV figures represented UTV’s fifth successive year of outperformance of ITV1, giving it a record share of 2.69% of the ITV1 advertising market.

UTV said it expected TV advertising revenues to increase by 5% in the first quarter of this year, while radio advertising is set to lift by 20%.

Chairman John McGuckian said 2004 had been a year of outstanding achievement for UTV in all three of its businesses.

“Advertising prospects generally for the current year appear to be good,” he said.

UTV said operating profits in its television business lifted by £3.5m (€5.1m) as the implementation of the Granada/Carlton merger undertakings had limited substantial network programme cost increases in the past four years.

In radio, operating profits were flat at £2.5m (€3.6m) due to the costs of relaunching and rebranding Dublin radio station Q102 in 2004.

The group said continuing growth in its broadband customer base helped it to lift turnover in its internet and telecoms business by 44% to £5.4m (€7.8m).

UTV’s stand-alone telecoms product UTV Talk, which was launched in August 2004, was making very good progress, but was not yet contributing to profitability due to initial costs.

On Wednesday, ITV is expected to say savings generated by the merger of Granada and Carlton should ensure it grew profits last year, with analysts looking for figures of about £282m (€409m) against a pro-forma £217m (€315m) in 2003.