For a company in the communications business, Eircom seems uncommonly poor at getting its message across. The announcement this week that profits would suffer as the company reorganised to take account of the more competitive environment in which it finds itself left the markets nonplussed.

Was it a profit warning or was it a statement of positive intent to aggressively grow the company? Nobody knew and as a result the shares, volatile at the best of times, spent the day of the announcement see-sawing down and up.

While profits will undoubtedly fall in the short term, the market now seems to have settled on the notion that it is a necessary price for the group to pay to get itself fit for the road ahead.

But there are no guarantees and certainly Eircom is finding it difficult to compete on all fronts with a host of vibrant small and adaptable telecoms outfits.