Within 24 hours of Eircom unveiling its maiden interim figures to fanfare in Dublin, a deathly hush fell over large parts of the city.

Could it be the revenge of disillusioned investors smarting over the share's relatively poor performance since the early days of the flotation, a plot to cut the lifeline of the mobile phone generation or simply the early arrival of the Y2K bug?

Apparently a software problem was to blame, bringing down all land-line connections in parts of the capital as well as disrupting the mobile networks of both Eircom's subsidiary Eircell and its rival Esat Digifone. Whatever it was, it was serious enough to bring an abrupt halt to proceedings on RTE's Liveline with Joe Duffy. Eircom was quick to deny, however, that the collapse had anything to do with the Millennium Bug. The blip was not serious enough, however, to prevent Eircom's share price resuming its upward march yesterday having dipped on Thursday after results which showed profits up over 11 per cent at €160 million on the back of a surge in mobile phone and Internet usage.