Bitbuzz on course for €2m in revenue

GROWTH AT wifi network operator Bitbuzz pushed revenue higher this year, with the company on track for revenues of about €2 million this year.

According to the company, revenues for the first six months of the year rose to €940,000, compared with full-year revenue of €1.2 million in 2011.

“Our revenues have grown quite substantially over about two years,” said managing director Shane Deasy. “We expect to get just under the €2 million mark for 2012, which would be a further 40-45 per cent increase. We’re very happy with that.”

The company is not releasing profit figures, but Mr Deasy said Bitbuzz was profitable and had been since 2004. “We’re constantly investing in the service and the product.”

Bitbuzz said subscribers continued to increase in the first half of the year, with 858,200 registered users at the end of June, compared with 460,000 in the same period of 2011. Logins per month are now more than 400,000 and passed the 100,000-a-week milestone last month.

The rise comes as the company’s hot spots increased, with 411 across the country. compared with 272 in June 2011, a rise of 51 per cent. Data downloads were also up on a per-user basis, rising 17 per cent to 338MB from 280MB at the start of the year.

Mr Deasy attributed the rise to the growing popularity of smartphones, helping the company to increase its user base from laptop users.

“Even though smartphone users don’t stay online that long, they log in a lot more often, checking Facebook etc, with a lot more short sessions,” he said.

Also helping is Bitbuzz’s conferencing product, which has been rolled out to a number of hotels.