Sussex-based Rentokil Initial today said it had no plans to break itself up as it revealed a 10% fall in half-year pre-tax profits to £180.4 million.

The troubled pest control-to-hygiene group, which has ousted its former chairman and chief executive and warned on profits since May, insisted its problems were operational, rather than structural.

It added that its parcels and conferencing operations, the divisions that have attracted most talk of a sell-off, were "highly profitable and relatively trouble-free".

Chairman Brian McGowan, who has launched a review of the business, said Rentokil did not suffer from "the problem of a good core business being held back by under-performing peripheral businesses".

"The key to Rentokil is not in divestment potential," he said. "It is in getting the operational businesses working more efficiently and effectively."

Thursday August 26, 2004