While revenues from metro Ethernet and fiber infrastructure services remained steady, AboveNet's WAN service revenues in the third quarter were "under pressure."

"Metro Ethernet products continue to be the technology of choice," AboveNet President and CEO Bill LaPerch said in a conference call. "We added revenue from new and existing customers" during the quarter. "Financial services headed the list, although as a percent of revenue, financial services held steady at 30 percent.

"In our view, it's still a tough spending environment."

AboveNet's revenue in the third quarter was about $92.4 million - a 12.5-percent increase from the same period last year. Within that figure, revenue from domestic metro services grew by almost one half since one year ago and domestic WAN service revenue grew by about 35 percent.

The company's net income in the third quarter of 2009 was about $22.7 million - a more than 50-percent increase from about $10.4 one year ago.

"Our strategy to focus on Web services is paying off," LePerch said. "Business conditions do remain very challenging. Competition is very tough. Our customers aren't sure about the future. That makes them very cautions about spending decisions."

One of the recession's effects the company noticed was shrinkage of deal sizes. Companies have been breaking down previously large projects into small pieces and implementing them incrementally.

Additionally, contract terminations and customer infrastructure downgrades have been up from last year.

To stay aggressive in the increasingly competitive environment, AboveNet is expanding its sales force to increase its "share of the customer wallet." The company is planning to add 15-20 percent of its sales staff.