Rentokil says on track for year after Q1 revenue rise

(Adds CEO, analyst comments, share price, detail)

By Li-mei Hoang

LONDON, May 1 (Reuters) - British support services firm Rentokil Initial (LSE: RTO.L - news) said it was on track to achieve its full-year expectations after a 2.2 percent rise in revenue in the first quarter, helped by strong growth in Britain, North America and Latin America.

The company, which offers services from pest control to the supply of workwear, said on Friday that revenue from its ongoing operations rose to 416 million pounds ($638 million) in the first three months of the year.

"With this encouraging start to the year, we are on track to achieve our 2015 revenue, profit and cash expectations," said Chief Executive Andy Ransom.

Ransom told Reuters he had a positive outlook for the remainder of the year, after seeing a 26 percent rise in its emerging markets division.

"We've got off to a good start and we are pretty confident about the balance of the year across the piece," he said.

The company said it had completed six acquisitions in the first quarter with a combined revenue of 15 million and aimed to spend around 50 million on acquisitions this year.

"I would still be hopeful that we can do above 50 million but at the moment I think 50 million is a pretty good number," said Ransom.

Shares (Berlin: DI6.BE - news) in the company were up by 1.3 percent at 136 pence by 0725 GMT.

"Rentokil provided a short but positive update on Q1 trading. We believe improving GDP growth in the euro zone may help Rentokil as the year goes on, which is one of the reasons we are positive about the outlook," said Bank of America Merrill Lynch analysts in a note.

The company is expected to report a pretax profit of 194.5 million for the full year, according to a Thomson Reuters poll of 12 analysts.

Rentokil, which generates around 90 percent of its revenues abroad, said it estimated the negative impact of currency movements on the full year to be around 14 million pounds due to sterling strengthening against the euro but falling against the dollar.

Ransom also shrugged off concerns about Britain's election this month and said he was upbeat about outlook for the pest control industry which is worth 10 billion pounds.

"The rats don't notice the election. We are not paying too much attention to it either," said Ransom. ($1 = 0.6519 pounds) (Reporting by Li-mei Hoang; Editing by Paul Sandle and Keith Weir)