HSS business on upward curve with sustained investment.

HSS Hire Service Group a UK supplier of tool and equipment and outsourcing services, has increased its second quarter revenue by 6.5% (to £42.6 million) compared to 2010. This contributes to a half year's revenue increase of 9.2% - £89.5million. Profitability (EBITDA) is up 10.4% to £19.5m for the first half year although in Q2 this was flat over 2010.

HSS Hire says that these results are ahead of market performance and the group continues to build on the strong performance in 2010. The new national logistic and maintenance programme incorporating full national 24-hour operation commenced roll out to plan and HSS Outsource Cleaning was launched.

Chris Davies, chief executive at HSS Hire said, "We have delivered another quarter of sustained growth. This is an encouraging performance given the challenging economic and competitive environment and confirms our strategy of customer-centric propositions in primarily the 'maintain and operate' sectors. It is also encouraging to see growth in all the UK and Ireland regions.

"EBITDA has been maintained whilst making significant investments in the logistic network and transitioning to a 24 hour maintenance operation, reducing cycle times and supporting higher utilisation. This additional investment will continue in H2 2011 to enable the full network transformation to be completed - positioning the business for further efficiency gains in 2012"

"This quarter we also launched HSS Outsource Cleaning, a completely new time/money saving proposition for cleaning and FM (facilities management) contractors. It takes our business into a significant equipment sector where rental penetration is less than 5%.

"Our priority remains generating a strong revenue and cash performance through growing our business and continuing to focus on customers, colleagues, cash and costs.

HSS says that it is focused on organic growth, particularly through its regional and key accounts and customer-centric propositions. It anticipates no change in outlook for the full year and the continues to expect to report steady growth despite the combined impact of the [long] spring holidays, the expiry of a Network Rail supply contract, lower than average cooling product revenues and challenging economic conditions.