Astra claims 9.75 German DTH households

SES-Astra today said that it has added 1.72 million households in Germany to bring the total number of DTH homes reached to 9.75 million (+21.5%). The company claims it remains the driving force and leading infrastructure in digital television in Germany.

In total, Germany had 36.98 million analogue and digital TV homes last year. The number of satellite households remains stable at 16.7 million. As a result, 45% of all TV households are directly served via satellite. Cable serves 17.9 million TV homes (48.4%). Terrestrial television alone is watched in 2.3 million homes (6.3%). While the number of cable households decreased by 600,000 in 2007, digital terrestrial TV increased its reach by 400,000 households.

These are the results of the latest Satellite Monitor, conducted annually by the market research institute TNS Infratest on behalf of SES Astra. For the monitoring, 6,000 telephone and face-to-face interviews were conducted all over Germany at the end of last year.

The methodology and the results are controlled by independent institutes.With an increase by 23.1 percent, the number of digital TV households in Germany has risen significantly last year and currently amounts to 15.61 million. The satellite serves two thirds of all digital households. For 63.3 percent or 9.88 million TV households, the digital satellite TV is the preferred reception mode, an increase by 20.9 percent compared to last year.

3.6 million TV homes (23.1 percent) are being served by digital cable. 2.06 million homes (13.2 percent) receive DTT. 50,000 households (0.03 percent) are currently being served via DSL, compared to 40,000 in 2006. The share of analogue TV households continues to decrease and currently amounts to 21.4 million. (Picture of dishes in the Berlin area of Neuköln courtesy of Wikimedia Commons)