Spice Plc (LON:SPI), the company that supplies outsourced services to utilities, this morning said that Freedom, the electricity arm of its distribution division, had extended its contracts with EDF Energy for major substation projects ‘workstream one’ and overhead line works ‘workstream five’. The extended contracts, which run to the end of 2015, are of similar value to the previous contracts, together totalling revenues of around £18m per year. Martin Towers, Spice’s chief executive, described the agreements as “excellent news”. Earlier this week, Spice received an increased conditional proposal from private equity firm Cinven in the range of 62p-65p per share, which it said still undervalued the company.

Elsewhere, shares in Interserve (LON:IRV) rose by 1.7% to 205.5p on news that the international services, maintenance and building group had traded in line with expectations during the first half of 2010 and was expecting a better performance during the rest of the year. The company said it was continuing to benefit from its exposure to international markets, particularly in its Middle East construction and services businesses and in Australia. However, its equipment services operation in the Gulf is performing behind last year's exceptionally strong level, as it returns to a more balanced hire:sale mix. In the UK, it said its construction and facilities management operations had both grown but that uncertainty over public sector spending was now a concern. Nevertheless, a significant international exposure and a future workload of approximately £6bn has given the group strong visibility of around 90% and 60% of 2010 and 2011 anticipated revenues respectively.

At Brammer (LON:BRAM), the pan European added value technical distributor, the shares were up 5.3% to 147.50p on confirmation that the company had enjoyed double-digit sales growth during May and June, with “good development” in all countries. With the second quarter substantially ahead of the first quarter, Brammer said that year on year Key Account growth was running at 15.7%, and it was continuing to see a strong recovery in the automotive sector. Insite growth in the first half was 18.3% as the business racked up market share gains in fluid power and tools and general maintenance. The company said it was confident of continuing to be able to grow at a rate “substantially in excess of the market”.

Finally, shares in Cyril Sweett Group Plc…

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