English Entertainment
Q3-16: DIRECTV mitigates AT&T U-Verse TV subscriber numbers fall
BENGALURU: AT&T acquired DIRECTV added 323,000 net subscribers and hence helped mitigate the company’s Entertainment and Internet Services Group (Entertainment) segment’s loss of 326,000 U-Verse subscribers for the quarter ended 30 September 2016 (Q3-16, current quarter). About 70 percent of DIRECTV net additions were consumers transitioning from U-Verse says the company. The Entertainment Group ended the quarter with 25.3 million (2.53 crore) video subscribers. Further, the company says it has added 156,000 broadband subscribers during the current quarter.
However, the total number of video connections of the Entertainment Group were slightly lower than the 25.4 million connections in Q3-16. At September 30, 2016, Entertainment had approximately 51.0 million revenue connections, compared to 52.6 million at September 30, 2015,
Total revenues of the segment were $12.7 billion ($1,270 crore), up 17.1 percent versus the year-earlier quarter mostly due to the acquisition of DIRECTV. Also contributing to the gain was continued growth in consumer IP services informs the company. Video and Ad sales constitute about 70 percent of the Entertainment Group’s revenue, IP Voice/Data about 19 percent legacy and other revenues the balance 11 percent. Broadband revenues were up 5 percent in the quarter with IP broadband growing by 12 percent. AdWorks has grown to a $1.5 billion ($150 crore) annualized revenue stream with double-digit revenue growth year to date and strong margins.
Consolidated Numbers
AT&T’s consolidated revenues for the third quarter totaled $40.9 billion ($4,900 crore) , up 4.6 per cent versus the year-earlier period due to the July 24, 2015 acquisition of DIRECTV. Excluding the impact of the DIRECTV acquisition and foreign exchange, revenues were essentially flat, as growth in video and IP-based services mostly offset pressures from declines in wireless and legacy services. Compared with results for the third quarter of 2015, operating expenses were $34.5 billion ($3,450 crore) versus $33.2 billion ($3,320 crore); operating income was $6.4 billion ($s 640 crore) versus $5.9 billion ($590 crore) ; and operating income margin was 15.7 percent versus 15.2 percent. When adjusting for $0.14 of amortization, $0.03 in merger- and integration-related costs and $0.03 of employee-separation costs, operating income was $8.3 billion ($830 crore) versus $7.9 billion ($790 crore); and operating income margin was 20.3 percent, consistent with the year-ago quarter.
Third-quarter net income attributable to AT&T totalled $3.3 billion ($330 crore) or $0.54 per diluted share, compared to $3.0 billion ($300 crore), or $0.50 per diluted share, in the year ago quarter. Adjusting for $0.20 of amortization, merger- and integration related costs and other expenses, earnings per diluted share was $0.74 compared to an adjusted $0.74 in the year-ago quarter.
Time-Warner takeover
As mentioned earlier, AT&T plans to take over Time Warner in a blockbuster $85.4 billion ($8,540 crore) that will completely change the media landscape, A Senate subcommittee responsible for competition will hold a hearing in November 2016. Media reports say that the announcement of the deal has raised concerns in the US, ‘with lawmakers, analysts and advocacy groups closely watching to see if the union, or any that follow in its wake, poses harm to consumers’ says a New York Times report.
According to a BBC report, a spokesman for the Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton has said there were “a number of questions and concerns” about the deal that regulators needed to scrutinise, but added “there’s still a lot of information that needs to come out before any conclusions should be reached”.
The BBC report further alleges that Republican candidate Donald Trump has said that he would block the merger if he wins, because it was “too much concentration of power in the hands of too few”.
UK: The aerial is losing its grip. As broadband becomes the default way Britons watch television, the UK is edging towards a decisive, and divisive, question: should Freeview be switched off by 2034? The issue, highlighted in reporting by The Guardian, has exposed deep fault lines over access, affordability and the future of public service broadcasting.
For nearly 25 years, Freeview has delivered free-to-air television from the BBC, ITV, Channel 4 and Channel 5 to almost every corner of the country. Even now, it remains the UK’s largest TV platform, used in more than 16m homes and on around 10m main household sets. Yet the same broadcasters that built it are now pressing for its closure within eight years.
Their case rests on a structural shift in viewing. Smart TVs, superfast broadband and the Netflix-led streaming boom have pulled audiences online. Advertising economics have followed. By 2034, the number of homes using Freeview as their main TV set is forecast to fall from a peak of almost 12m in 2012 to fewer than 2m, making digital terrestrial television, or DTT, increasingly costly to sustain.
But critics say the rush to switch off risks abandoning those least able, or least willing, to move online.
“I don’t want to be choosing apps and making new accounts,” says Lynette, 80, from Kent. “It is time-consuming and irritating trying to work out where I want to be, to remember the sequence of clicks, with hieroglyphics instead of words. If I make a mistake I have to start again.”
Lynette is among nearly 100,000 people who have signed a “save Freeview” petition launched by campaign group Silver Voices. She fears the government is about to “take [Freeview] away from me and others who either don’t like, can’t afford, or can’t use online versions”.
Official figures underline the fault lines. A report commissioned by the Department for Culture, Media and Sport estimates that by 2035, 1.8m homes will still depend on Freeview. Ofcom’s analysis shows those households are more likely to be disabled, older, living alone, female, and based in the north of England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland.
Freeview is owned by the public service broadcasters through Everyone TV, which also operates Freesat and the newer streaming platform Freely. After two years of review, DCMS is expected to set out its position soon, drawing on three options proposed by Ofcom: a costly upgrade of Freeview’s ageing technology; maintaining a bare-bones service with only core PSB channels; or a full switch-off during the 2030s.
The broadcasters have rallied behind the third option. They argue that 2034 is the logical cut-off, when transmission contracts with network operator Arqiva expire. By then, they say, the cost of broadcasting to a dwindling audience will far outweigh the returns from TV advertising.
Ofcom agrees a crunch point is approaching. In July, the regulator warned of a “tipping point” within the next few years, after which it will no longer be commercially viable for broadcasters to carry the costs of DTT.
Others see risks beyond economics. Questions remain over whether internet TV can reliably deliver emergency broadcasts, such as the daily Covid updates, in the way that universally available DTT can. The UK radio industry has also warned that an internet-only future for TV could push up distribution costs and force some radio stations off air if PSBs no longer share Arqiva’s mast network.
“It is a political hot potato,” says Dennis Reed, founder of Silver Voices, who says he has “dissociated” his organisation from the government’s stakeholder forum, which he believes is “heavily biased” towards streaming.
The Future TV Taskforce, representing the PSBs, counters that moving online could “close the digital divide once and for all”. “We want to be able to plan to ensure that no one is left behind,” a spokesperson says, adding that rising DTT costs could otherwise mean cuts to programme budgets.
The numbers show the scale of the challenge. Of the 1.8m Freeview-dependent homes projected for 2035, around 1.1m are expected to have broadband but not use it for TV. The remaining 700,000 are forecast to lack a broadband connection altogether.
Veterans of the analogue switch-off, completed in 2012 after 76 years, recall similar fears of “TV blackout chaos”. Around 6 per cent of households were labelled “digital refuseniks”, yet a targeted help scheme and a national campaign, fronted by a robot called Digit Al voiced by Matt Lucas, delivered a largely smooth transition.
This time, the BBC is less keen to foot the bill. Tim Davie, the outgoing director general, has said the corporation should not fund a comparable support programme for a Freeview switch-off.
Research for Sky by Oliver & Ohlbaum suggests that with early awareness campaigns and digital inclusion measures, only about 330,000 households would ultimately need hands-on help ahead of a 2034 shutdown.
Meanwhile, viewing habits continue to fragment. Audience body Barb says 7 per cent of UK households no longer own a TV set, choosing to watch on other devices. In December, YouTube overtook the BBC’s combined channels in total UK viewing across TVs, smartphones and tablets, albeit measured at a minimum of three minutes.
That shift may accelerate. YouTube has recently blocked Barb and its partner Kantar from accessing viewing session data, limiting transparency just as online platforms consolidate power.
“When the government chose British Satellite Broadcasting as the ‘winner’ in satellite TV it was Rupert Murdoch’s Sky instead that came out on top,” says a senior TV executive quoted by The Guardian. “There already is such an outsider ready to be the winner in the transition to internet TV; it is YouTube.”
Freeview’s future now hangs on a familiar British dilemma: modernise fast and risk exclusion, or protect universality and pay the price. Either way, the aerial’s days as king of the living room look numbered.
