Sky sees profit, revenue and customer growth

BSkyB has posted increased profit and revenue for the six months to December, and raised its customer base by 100,000 over the period.

Sky posted a half-year operating profit of £601 million (€717 million), up 16% year-on-year, while revenue grew by 6% to £3.4 billion. Sky’s customer base at the end of December was 10.471 million, while its triple-play base grew to three million, up 26%. The company reported 2.5 million users of its Sky Go service, given as a bonus to subscribers, which enables customers to view content on a range of devices inside and outside the home.

HD subscribers numbered 4.06 million, up 138,000 on the previous quarter, while multiroom customers numbered 2.35 million, up 55,000. Broadband customers numbered 3.65 million, up 166,000. ARPU stood at £544, up £8 year-on-year, while churn was up only very slightly at 9.6%.

The solid results came despite a fall in advertising revenue in the period. CEO Jeremy Darroch said that Sky had added value to its offering and had improved efficiency, enabling it to expand margins. “We expect the environment to remain tough in calendar 2012. No consumer business can be immune to these conditions and we will manage any short-term headwinds as they emerge,” he said. “Staying focused on the long-term opportunity, we’ve got a strong set of plans to keep delivering for customers and shareholders. This will be an outstanding year on screen, including more original British productions and a new channel dedicated to Formula 1, and we have exciting products in the pipeline that will create more ways to access our content and more reasons to join and stay with us.”

Separately, Sky Sports has secured rights to four more years of live international and county cricket under a new deal with the ECB. With the existing deal concluding at the end of 2013, the new deal begins in 2014 and continues until the end of the summer in 2017. Sky has secured rights to live coverage of England’s home Test matches, one-day and T20 internationals and county matches.