* Full year pre-tax loss of 235.7 mln stg
* Annual net rental income plunges 33%
* Co's survey shows strong customer demand
(Adds CEO, CFO comments, share price)
By Aby Jose Koilparambil
June 3 (Reuters) - Workspace Group on Thursday
slipped to its first annual loss in 12 years as COVID-19
battered occupancies and rents, with the office-space provider
saying it would take a couple of years to recover to
pre-pandemic levels.
Shares of the FTSE 250 firm fell as much as 3.6% after it
said it lost around a tenth of its customers, comprising mostly
small and medium-sized enterprises and entrepreneur businesses,
in the wake of the coronavirus pandemic.
Employees and consumers were marooned at homes by lockdowns,
while companies were forced to cut costs with few investing.
Workspace Chief Financial Officer David Benson told Reuters
the company expects to see "significant" recovery this year
after reporting a pre-tax loss of 235.7 million pounds for the
12 months ended March 31.
"Certainly over the next couple of years, we will be
recovering back to where we were pre-COVID," said Benson.
The London-focused company, which serves a varied client
base from architects to florists and craft beer brewers to app
developers, said a survey on future space requirements over the
year showed that only 12% of its clients thought they would
reduce space.
"Over 60% of them (clients) said they thought they would be
taking about the same amount of space. 25% thought it would be
taking more space," said Chief Executive Officer Graham Clemett
on an earnings call.
Annual net rental income plunged 33% to 81.5 million
pounds, while the underlying value of its properties slipped
10%.
($1 = 0.7067 pounds)
(Reporting by Aby Jose Koilparambil in Bengaluru; Editing by
Rashmi, Patrick Graham, Kirsten Donovan)
Workspace (WKP)