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DTH firms need 10 mn subs to cash break even
MUMBAI: Indian direct-to-home (DTH) operators have a long road to travel before they can start counting their profits.
Dish TV and Tata Sky, the two leading companies, expect to achieve a full cash flow break even once they achieve 10 million subscribers.
Dish TV hopes to reach that milestone by 2012 as it targets to add 2.5 million subscribers this fiscal, capitalising from a sports-heavy year that has the soccer and cricket World Cups.
In FY’10, Dish TV mopped up 1.8 million subscribers amid price war and stiff competition from players like Sun Direct, Airtel Digital TV and Tata Sky.
Tata Sky, which acquired 1.4 million new subscribers in FY’10, hopes to post a speedier growth this year. The entire DTH sector, in fact, expects 10-11 million subscriber addition on the back of sports events in the year.
“The break even will come only after a DTH operator crosses a subscriber base of 10 million despite low ARPUs (average revenue per user). At least, that looks like the case with Dish TV and Tata Sky,” says a media analyst who closely tracks the sector.
Airtel Digital TV believes the economic viability and profitability of the DTH industry rests on three pillars. “The speed of acquisition is important. The content cost, at 50 per cent of cable TV pricing, is also on the higher side. DTH companies also have a tax liability of over 35 per. If these things get corrected, we will have a profitable industry,” says Bharti Airtel director & CEO – DTH Ajai Puri.
Airtel Digital TV has the fastest growth among all the DTH operators, pocketing 27 per cent of the incremental subscribers. “If you take out the southern region, we will be having an incremental share of 33 per cent,” says Puri.
The DTH sector is stung by low ARPUs, higher content cost (despite moving to a fixed rate model with broadcasters) and an advertising spend that is estimated at Rs 6 billion a year.
Videocon, however, believes it can be ebitda positive sooner than the older players. “We expect to be ebitda positive after reaching 4-5 million subscribers. The industry has got a lot more regularised and this is apparent even on the content side. The prices of set-top boxes (STBs) have fallen and customer acquisition is happening a lot more faster. As for us, we have the advantage of a backward integration model,” says Videocon d2h chief executive officer Anil Khera.
DTH companies are waiting for the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (Trai) to come out with its recommendations on tariff by the month-end. They expect the sector regulator to fix a policy that will have similar pricing for DTH and cable for addressable digitisation.
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With 57 per cent single new users, Ashley Madison rebrands as discreet dating platform
Platform says majority of new members now identify as single
INDIA: Ashley Madison is shedding the “married-dating” label that defined it for two decades, repositioning itself as a platform for discreet dating in what it calls the post-social media age.
The rebrand, unveiled in India on 27 February, 2026, marks a structural shift in business model and identity. Once synonymous with married dating, the company now describes itself as the “premier destination for discreet dating” under a new tagline: Where Desire Meets Discretion.
The pivot is data-driven. Internal figures show that 57 per cent of global sign-ups between 1 January and 31 December, 2025 identified as single: a notable departure from the platform’s married core. The company argues that its community has already evolved beyond its original positioning.
“In an age where our lives have been constantly put on public display, privacy has become the new luxury,” said Ashley Madison chief strategy officer Paul Keable. He framed the platform’s offering as “ethical discretion” for singles, separated, divorced and non-monogamous users seeking private connections.
The shift also taps into wider digital fatigue. A global survey conducted by YouGov for Ashley Madison, covering 13,071 adults across Australia, Brazil, Canada, Germany, India, Italy, Mexico, Spain, Switzerland, the UK and the US, found mounting discomfort with hyper-public online lives.
Among dating app users, 30 per cent cited constant swiping and messaging as a source of fatigue, while 24 per cent pointed to pressure to curate public-facing profiles and early personal disclosure. Some 27 per cent said fears of screenshots or information being shared contributed to exhaustion; an equal share cited unwanted attention.
The retreat from oversharing appears broader. According to the survey, 46 per cent of adults actively try to keep most aspects of their life private online. Only 8 per cent feel comfortable sharing most aspects publicly, while 35 per cent say they are becoming more selective about what they disclose.
Ashley Madison is betting that this cultural recalibration towards controlled visibility can be monetised. By doubling down on privacy infrastructure and reframing itself around discretion rather than infidelity, the company is attempting to convert reputational baggage into a premium proposition.
