Report: Healthy Gains for European Cable TV

LONDON: European cable revenues grew 5.4 percent in 2008 to reach 18.8 billion euros, according to new research from Screen Digest, driven in part by the success of triple-play platforms.

The research, carried out in conjunction with the Cable Europe trade organization, notes that of the 18.8 billion euros in revenues from cable last year, 17.4 billion euros were generated by EU countries. Key to the industry’s success has been triple play, which is increasing average revenue per subscriber in a region where the overall growth in the number of cable homes has slowed. ARPU in the EU was 21.45 euros at the end of 2008, up from 20.79 euros in 2007. For Europe as a whole, ARPU rose from 21.06 euros to 21.90 euros.

The average number of services taken by subscriber is 1.29 in Europe overall, 1.4 in the EU and 1.42 in Western Europe, suggesting plenty of room for growth of triple-play services, which are at present most popular in the U.K. and Spain. Total digital penetration in the EU stood at 29 percent at the end of the year, bringing the number of digital cable homes to 18 million. Of these, 27 percent subscriber to cable Internet services and 21 percent subscribe to telephony services from their cable provider.

Europe’s largest digital cable TV market is the U.K. with 3.5 million digital homes, followed by Germany with 3.3 million and the Netherlands with 2 million.