Emerging Markets to Drive Satellite Pay-TV Growth

PARIS/MONTREAL/WASHINGTON, D.C.: According to Euroconsult's newly released report, nearly 100 percent of subscription and revenue growth in the global satellite pay-TV industry by 2023 will come from non-mature markets.

The Satellite Pay-TV: Key Economics & Prospects report finds that subscriptions to satellite pay TV reached 196 million homes in 2013 and revenues topped $97 billion. Emerging markets now account for 60 percent of global subscribers, as well as nearly 100 percent of subscription growth.

In the past five years, emerging markets have been the most active in rolling out new platforms, increasing subscriber bases, growing revenues and adding TV channels. They have also reduced the technical gap with mature markets' platforms in terms of value-added services rolled out. "Emerging markets are home to over 80 percent of the nearly 160 active platforms," said Dimitri Buchs, consultant at Euroconsult and editor of the report. "Over 95 percent of platforms launched in the past three years operate in these markets." The share of revenues coming from emerging markets is lower due to the large availability of low-cost services in these countries, but it has also increased in recent years, from 15 percent in 2008 to 26 percent in 2013.

Alongside new platform launches, a growing trend in emerging markets has been the expansion into new markets for existing players—this has been particularly true in Sub-Saharan Africa and Latin America. The launch of 60 platforms in the past five years has led to an oversupply in certain emerging markets, including Indonesia, which had the highest number of active players in November 2014. Several large, fast-growing satellite pay-TV markets (Russia and Brazil) began to consolidate in 2014, following a slowdown in growth over the last few years.

Emerging markets should account for nearly 100 percent of growth in subscriptions, revenues and number of TV channels by 2023. Global subscriptions should reach 340 million in 2023; emerging markets should account for nearly 80 percent of the total, with Asia and Sub-Saharan Africa expected to be the fastest-growing regions. Nearly 30,000 channels should be distributed in 2023, with growth driven by the uptake of HD in emerging markets and rollout of the first ultra-HD channels.