Telecoms firm Perlico racked up losses of nearly €2.25 million in 2005, according to its latest set of accounts.
Abridged accounts for the company showed a deficit in its profit and loss account of €3.4 million for the year ended on December 31st, 2005, compared to a deficit of €1.16 million for the previous year.
Perlico, which provides voice, single billing, broadband DSL and internet dial-up services to both residential and corporate customers, is spending more than €250,000 a month on advertising to gain market share, according to market sources.
It is currently advertising a broadband sale on television and plans to move into the mobile market in 2007 as it prepares for an initial public offering on the Alternative Investment Market in London next September.
The company is in talks to rent wholesale airspace from an established mobile player to set itself up as a mobile virtual network operator.
Perlico has been in business since 2003 and officially launched its products on the Irish market in September 2004. Last year, it signed a €3 million three-year network outsourcing deal with MCI to carry its international calls and provide a backbone for broadband traffic.
It is headed by chief executive Iain MacDonald and his father Malcolm, a former corporate financier with ICC and Bank of Scotland, who is chairman of the firm.
At the beginning of 2005, it raised €3.7 million in a round of funding. The funding was secured from private investors, including Dr Jim Mountjoy, Roger Bannon, Malcolm Mac Donald and Martin Crotty.
Dr Mountjoy, a former founder of software development firm Euristix and a co-founder of Baltimore Technologies, is a non-executive director, as is David Martin, former financial director of IAWS Group.
