Report: Four Companies Control Half of Western Europe’s Pay-TV Subs

LONDON: A new report from Digital TV Research finds that Liberty Global, Sky Europe, Vodafone and Altice jointly account for half the pay-TV subs in Western Europe.

According to the Western Europe Pay TV Operator Forecasts report, 73 top operators collectively accounted for 93 percent of Western Europe’s pay-TV subscribers by end-2015. Despite adding 7 million subscribers to take the total to 97.26 million, this proportion will fall slightly, to 92 percent of the region’s 105 million pay-TV subscribers by 2021.

The firm also reports that 29 of the 30 IPTV platforms will gain subscribers between 2015 and 2021. However, 14 of the 21 satellite platforms and 7 of the 8 DTT operators will lose subscribers during the same period. Half of the cable platforms will gain subs.

Liberty Global is the region’s largest operator by pay-TV subs. Counting only its satellite TV subs, Sky Europe is rapidly closing the gap. Liberty Global will lose 1.15 million subs (mostly analog ones) between 2015 and 2021, whereas Telefonica will gain 1.23 million and Altice nearly 1 million. Liberty Global and Sky Europe together are expected to continue to take just under half of the region’s revenues in the 2021 projection.