Atos has issued its second profit warning in seven months in its preliminary FY2021 financial figures.
The French services giant told investors the revised guidance communicated in July last year will not be met due to “several significant effects”.
Atos had already lowered its annual objectives following a slower-than-expected recovery in the year’s first half.
The company now expects a 2.4 percent drop in its 2021 full-year revenues, totalling €10.8 billion against the previous forecast for a “stable” performance.
It predicts an operating margin of four percent, down from the formerly stated six percent target.
As for free cash flow, Atos estimates the figure to arrive at -€420 million compared to a previous forecast for positive free cash flow.
Atos attributed its revenue drop to the “unexpected” reassessment of the cost to go on transformation, re-platforming and operations of a financial services BPO contract, leading to a “major revision” of the completion rate on the project.
Other factors affecting the group’s performance include big data, HPC and unified communications & collaboration project slippages due to supply chain challenges, delays on standard contracts, and the reduced low margin hardware and software resale.
The revised figures came days after the group’s new CEO, Rodolphe Belmer, took over.
