CEE pay TV growth levelling off, but still significant

Pay TV revenues in central and eastern Europe are continuing to grow but at a much lower rate than in previous years, according to Digital TV Research.

The research outfit said that pay TV revenues in the region will grow by 9.9% between 2015 and 2021 to reach US$5.97 billion (€5.24 billion) – a rate of growth slower than the 27% estimated by Digital TV Research for the five years between 2010 and 2015.

According to Digital TV Research, the pay TV subscriber count will increase by fewer than one million in the 2015-21 period. While digital pay TV subscribers will increase from 25.84 million, or 20.7% of all pay TV households, in 2015 to 54.63 million, or 42.8% of pay TV homes, in 2021, this growth will largely be offset by the decline in analogue customers.

Revenue growth will largely result from low-value analogue customers upgrading to more expensive digital packages. Digital pay TV revenues will reach US$5.77 billion by 2020, up US$3 billion on the 2020 figure and up US$1.4 billion on the 2015 figure, according to the research.

Pay TV will be taken by 62.3% of the region’s TV homes in 2021, amounting to 80.05 million homes in total, according to Digital TV Research’s principal analyst Simon Murray. While this figure amounts to an increase of 20 million on the 2010 figure, it is less than one million up on the 2015 figure.