Former state owned French IT company Bull posted revenues of EUR 234.5m (£184m) for the first quarter of 2008, 5.1 per cent down on the first quarter of 2007.

Bull said that taking into account the affects of divested businesses and fluctuating currency exchange rates, the decrease was 2.5 per cent.

Revenues from Bull Group’s Hardware and Systems Solutions division, which includes the company’s core server and mainframe business, were down 9.5 per cent to EUR 58.1m (£45.6m) year on year, though the secure storage and high performance computing (HPC) segments saw strong sales.

Other contributors to Bull’s overall Q1 2008 shortfall came from the Maintenance business revenue, down 8 per cent to EUR 48.6m (£38.1m), and a 39 per cent drop in revenues from Bull’s Fulfillment and Third Party Products division, down to EUR 21.1m (£16.5m) year on year.

Better news came from Bull’s Services and Solutions business, which saw revenues grow 11.7 per cent to EUR 106.6m (£84.6m).