(Reuters) – Office rental firm IWG Plc reported a slight fall in third-quarter revenue on Tuesday as a resurgence in global COVID-19 cases further hampered its clients’ plans to return to office.
The re-emergence of cases in several countries and the subsequent tightening of curbs in some places have compounded worries for office space providers, as businesses opt for shorter leases and many employees continue to work remotely.
IWG said occupancy at its pre-2020 operations was 71.2% in the third quarter, only slightly up from 70.1% in the year-ago period despite the lifting of heavy pandemic restrictions.
The Switzerland-headquartered company, which has centres in more than 3,300 locations across 110 countries, said group revenue was 550.8 million pounds ($752.1 million) in the three months ended Sept. 30, down 0.3% from the year-earlier period that was hit by restrictions and uncertainty.
The UK-listed owner of the Spaces and Regus brands, however, said outlook for the remainder of the year remained “encouraging”.
“The momentum in trading performance has accelerated during the third quarter, with demonstrable progress in all major territories and the outlook for the remainder of the year remains encouraging,” the company said in a trading update.
The FTSE 250 firm said it was on track to achieve targeted annualised run rate cost savings of about 320 million pounds by year-end.
($1 = 0.7323 pounds)
(Reporting by Aby Jose Koilparambil in Bengaluru; Editing by Rashmi Aich)