Spiritel (STP)-VoIP & termination services.

Spiritel close to profitability
Money*AM
Spiritel, the telecoms services business formed in 2004 from the reverse takeover by Roshni Investments of Expo Communications, posted a small loss for the first six months.

The company said it aims to be profitable in the second half of the current financial year to April 2006.

In the six months to October 31st, Spiritel suffered a pretax loss of £0.21m, compared with a restated deficit of £2.47m for the eight-month period to end-October 2004.

The company said trading in the first half was in line with its expectations. The loss reflected investment in the company's voice over internet protocol (VoIP) telephony product suite.

Spiritel said it has made significant progress towards its goal of becoming a leading player in VoIP telephony, which it said is widely expected to replace traditional fixed-line telephony in coming years.

It said it expects to receive significant revenues from VoIP in the year to April 2007.

Spiritel said Expo Communications, its core call termination division, traded profitably during the first six months and accounted for most of the company's sales of £8.12m.

Spiritel Technologies, the VoIP business, signed a series of reseller agreements during the period and extended its product range to include broadband telephony services for the residential market and IP trunking solutions for corporates.