M&S' food sales growth slows again after cyberattack, says NielsenIQ

LONDON, July 23 (Reuters) - British retailer Marks & Spencer's (MKS.L), opens new tab food business saw sales growth slow further to 4.3% year-on-year over the 12 weeks to July 12, reflecting the disruption that followed a cyberattack in April, industry data showed on Wednesday.

Researcher NielsenIQ said M&S' grocery sales growth slowed from 9.1% in last month's report and 10.8% in the one before that. Its market share did, however, hold steady at 3.6%.

As part of its management of the cyberattack, M&S stopped taking online clothing orders and also took other systems offline. That reduced food availability and also resulted in higher waste and logistics costs.

In May, M&S said the attack would cost it about 300 million pounds ($406 million) in lost operating profit.

The group resumed taking online orders for clothing lines on June 10 after a 46-day suspension following the attack, but it is yet to restart click and collect services.

Most of NielsenIQ's data broadly echoed the findings of rival researcher Worldpanel's report on Tuesday, with robust performances from market leader Tesco (TSCO.L), opens new tab, number two player Sainsbury's (SBRY.L), opens new tab, discounters Aldi and Lidl and online supermarket Ocado (OCDO.L), opens new tab.

However, M&S is not fully included in Worldpanel's market share data set.

($1 = 0.7390 pounds)