News 

The declines follows a loss of 4,000 customers during the last three months of 2007, with Orange blaming a saturated market.

"The business environment is marked by the drop in narrowband internet and portals and, more recently, by the levelling off of the ADSL broadband customer base," the company's financial report reads.

The company could also be feeling the effects of increased mobile broadband use, as well as the higher number of mobile phone users with access to unlimited data plans.

The

ADVERTISEMENT

comparison site Top 10 Broadband claimed earlier this year that if the trends towards mobile broadband uptake continued then the service could overtake home connections as early as 2010.

Other ISPs have also reported disappointing subscriber figures, although the market is still enjoying growth overall.

TalkTalk reported recently that it had fallen short of its target of adding 128,000 users to its service by only signing up 109,000 new customers, blaming the "slower consumer environment".

The Carphone Warehouse, which owns the TalkTalk brand, has also complained of poor performance in home broadband sales.

"If these trends continue, we expect lower revenue growth this year than previously indicated, compensated by improved margins," admitted Charles Dunstone in June, speaking to the Financial Times, prompting a 10% fall in the share price of the company.