Sky’s On Demand Surges in Popularity

LONDON: Alongside releasing its third-quarter results, BSkyB has announced that its customers have set records with their on-demand viewing, with average weekly downloads at 4.5 million, an increase of 460 percent on the same time last year.

For the first three months of 2013, an average of 45,000 customers connected their Sky box to broadband each week. This means that in total, more than 2.3 million Sky customers have now connected their Sky boxes to the Internet, up from 600,000 a year ago.

Building on this, Sky has announced that the first episodes of Hannibal, Mad Dogs, Trollied and The Borgias are being made available to download on demand a week before they launch on Sky’s entertainment channels. The premiere of the U.S. drama Hannibal is currently available to download, ahead of its launch on Sky Living.

Luke Bradley-Jones, Sky’s director of TV products, commented: “Our customers are really embracing our on demand service, which offers the U.K.’s biggest selection of catch-up TV, alongside hundreds of movies on demand and TV box sets. It’s also no wonder that tens of thousands are connecting their Sky+HD box to their home broadband each week to access great TV and movies on demand—and now including previews of the first episodes of new Sky series like Mad Dogs and Hannibal.
 
“We know that customers who use our connected TV services watch more of our programs and really value it. That’s why we are working hard to get even more Sky homes connected.”

For the nine months ending March 31, 2013, BSkyB posted revenue of £5.4 billion, up 6 percent. Operating profit was £994 million, a 9-percent gain.

Jeremy Darroch, the chief executive, commented:“We have had a good third quarter and our multi-product strategy is delivering strong results. Increased take-up across our product set led to another improvement in financial performance with growth in revenues and profits accelerating in the third quarter. Group revenues are up 6 percent, operating profit up 9 percent and earnings per share up 16 percent for the first nine months.

“Despite the tough consumer environment, we added 715,000 more subscription products in three months, taking the total past 30 million for the first time. On the back of this growth, we are creating 550 new jobs to meet demand for our products and serve our growing customer base.

“In our television business, we continue to see rapid growth in our connected TV services as customers take advantage of new ways to watch our content. The number of Internet-connected Sky+HD boxes grew by almost 45,000 every week in the quarter, leading to a fivefold increase in On Demand downloads and 37-percent growth in movie rentals against last year. Alongside the expansion of our mobile video service with the launch of Sky Go Extra, these trends are opening up new sources of future growth and value creation.

“These results highlight the way that our successful transition to more broadly-based growth has created a bigger, more profitable business. And having more ways to grow serves us particularly well at a time when household budgets look likely to remain stretched. We will continue to focus on overall product sales as the best means of delivering sustainable growth and returns for shareholders.”