Eurocopy’s shares fell 6p to 77p on the news.The company said it now intended to return to its policy of growth by acquisition in the rapidly polarising market It will also expand its sales force. It plans to offer domestic gas supplies in Scotland when the market is fully opened in 1998, but will not take part in next year’s pilot in the south-west of England.. NIGEL COPE

Eurocopy, the photocopier group that announced it was in bid talks in August, called off all discussions with potential bidders yesterday.
The company said it had not proved possible to reach a deal that was satisfactory to the chairman, Cyril Gay, and his family, who still control more than 50 per cent of the shares. Mr Robinson said the group continued to look for retail expansion opportunities north and south of the border and envisaged adding up to 40 stores over the next five years to its national network of 159.Scottish Power is pursuing the gas retailing business, with 6,000 customer sites in England, Scotland and Wales. Scottish Power already has 80 business customers for its fledgling communications arm and has invested pounds 35m in a fibre-optic network in the region. Mr Robinson is aiming for a 15 per cent share of the Scottish market in eight or nine years.The retail operation doubled its profit to pounds 4m in the first half on turnover up by 29 per cent.

It plans to launch a full public telephone service in Scotland next year, undercutting BT prices for domestic customers by up to 15 per cent. The company confirmed earlier projections of a full-year dividend of 15.5p.Scottish Power will continue its drive outside its core electricity operations in areas that include gas, retail and telecommunications. Earnings per share rose by 3.8 per cent to 11.4p and the interim dividend increased by 13.6 per cent to 5.17p per share. Scottish Power plans to wait until January before making a statement on the integration of the firm into the enlarged group, and on how the Manweb business will be moved forward.Mr Robinson also said that Scottish Power would cut 350 jobs in its own core operations over the next 12 months as a result of reorganisation, in addition to 140 people who left in the first half of the year.In the six months to 30 September, Scottish Power made a pre-tax profit of pounds 128m, up 3.9 per cent over the same period last year. Shares rose by 1p to 130p, still below the company’s issue price of 137p in May.. MARY FAGAN

Industrial Correspondent
About 850 Manweb employees left the company in the run-up to the pounds 1.1bn takeover last month by Scottish Power.

Ian Robinson, chief executive of the Scottish group, said he viewed the exodus, part of Manweb’s “scorched earth” defence policy as a “surprise” and “bonus”.Mr Robinson said that about 30 more people had left Manweb in the few weeks since the Scottish group moved in but that he had no feeling yet for how many more might go. It added 18,000 customers in the third quarter, for a total of 42,000 so far in 1995. “This is a reflection of our strategy to increase penetration by pricing competitively,” Mr Connell said. Nynex has also cut interconnection charges through increased use of its own switching equipment and has cut administrative and sales costs by 21 per cent.By the end of the period, Nynex’s network had passed a total of more than 1 million homes, up from 673,000 at the end of 1994. Moreover, revenues per cable customer were up 8 per cent like for like. From pounds 51m in the comparable period last year, operating losses rose to just over pounds 78m.The company has franchises covering 2.69 million homes, in the North of England, London and on the south coast, accounting for about 17 per cent of UK franchised homes.Average revenues per telephone customer have dropped as a result of aggressive pricing, but revenues overall from telephony have risen sharply.

Losses continued to mount, however, as the company built out its network. Following cuts in tariffs introduced by BT in the summer, Nynex has offered a 25 per cent discount to BT’s published prices for residential domestic and international calls since last month.
It had already been offering limited discounts prior to the cuts in October, as part of a strategy to increase penetration.Mr Connell made the announcement as he unveiled results for the nine months to 30 September. Revenues from combined cable television and telephony services doubled to pounds 57m in the nine months to 30 September. The company blamed industry overcapacity and competitive pricing.. MATHEW HORSMAN

Nynex CableComms, the country’s second-largest cable operator, will stick to its discount pricing for telephone services, its chief executive, Eugene Connell, said yesterday.

The satellite and cable broadcaster, which unveiled healthy quarterly earnings on Tuesday, has 4.38 million subscribers. Analysts expect the company to grow even faster if negotiations for rights to rugby union’s Five Nations Cup and other European matches end in an exclusive deal.News Corp’s operating income in Australia and Asia was down sharply to just $12m in the quarter, compared with $29m last time, due in part to higher development costs at Star-TV, where new channels are planned. A new cable service in Australia, Foxtel, was launched on 23 October.Lower earnings from Ansett, the airline and hotels group in which News holds 50 per cent interest, also dampened profits in the Far East. Circulation at the Sun remained at the 4 million-plus mark and at the Times at just over 680,000.BSkyB, 40 per cent owned by News Corp, put in a stellar performance. Circulation gains, as well as higher revenues from advertising, helped push operating income from newspapers to $80m from $77m.Cover price increases since last year had “little to no effect” on circulation, the company said. The newspaper division, grouped under the News International subsidiary, performed ahead of last year, despite sharply higher prices for newsprint.