Photo-Me clicks with ID card

A NEW identity card being introduced in France should see a boom in revenue for Photo-Me International, the company claimed today. Requirements for photocards for all users of the French health service mean some 48m new cards will have to be issued by the end of 2006. France is already one of the company's main markets, where it operates 8,900 photo booths. In addition, the Japanese will have a new generation of passports from March 2006 which will require holders to have new photos taken. Photo-Me may yet also cash in on Home Office plans for ID cards. The Government has not given details of how the system will work, but the company would benefit if people were expected to provide their own pictures. Pre-tax profits in the half-year to 31 October were £18m against £15.1m a year earlier, on turnover of £117.7m compared with £117.2m. The half-year dividend is 0.8p. The company, whose shares crashed to just 14p after a disastrous attempt to turn itself into an internet-based company during the dotcom boom, has seen its shares recover to 92p but still remain way below the peak of 436½p scaled in 2000. The group is hoping to get better profit margins from its digital media kiosks as it plans to make the machines more cheaply by using an Asian plant.