Price pressure and a steady exodus of traditional telephone customers cause DT's Q2 profits to plunge nearly 40 percent Deutsche Telekom is feeling the heat of competition big time. Europe’s largest telecommunications service provider on Thursday reported its fifth consecutive profit slide, caused by intense price pressure and a steady exodus of traditional telephone customers that was not fully offset by its growing broadband business.Net profit for the second quarter plunged nearly 40 percent to €608 million ($837 million as of June 30, the last day in the period being reported), from €1.02 billion in the same period a year earlier.Second-quarter revenue grew slightly, up 2.9 percent to €15.58 billion. However, domestic revenue dropped 6.3 percent to €7.62 billion, topped for the first time by international sales, which were up 13.7 percent to €7.95 billion. The international growth was driven in large part by Deutsche Telekom’s mobile phone operations. In the first six months, international revenue from the mobile operations was up 5.2 percent year-on-year, to €13.1 billion. T-Mobile International sells services in 11 European countries and the U.S.Deutsche Telekom, which for decades enjoyed a monopoly position in Germany, is struggling to heal its traditional fixed-line telephone business, which has been bleeding customers to competitive DSL (Digital Subscriber Line) services. Many consumers and small businesses in Germany are turning to lower cost rivals, such as Arcor, not only for high-speed Internet access but increasingly VOIP (voice over Internet Protocol) and IPTV (IP television) services.The German telco lost around 1.1 million traditional telephone customers in the first half of the year, including 516,000 in the second quarter. That loss what not compensated for by the 373,000 new broadband retail customers the carrier signed up in the second quarter. And that gain was lower than the 572,000 new broadband retail customers registered in the previous quarter.First-half revenue at T-Systems Enterprise Services, which sells communications service to large businesses, was down 6.4 percent to €6.8 billion year on year.Deutsche Telekom is looking for an international partner to help boost geographic coverage and sales for its struggling enterprise service unit. Technology Industry