The growth of Sky Deutschland AG accelerated in the fourth quarter of 2010, with a net addition of 131,000 subscribers bring the total to 2.653 million. “All operating key metrics showed good progress,” according to the company’s report for Q4 2010. The German paycaster confirmed it had reached agreement with News Corp for the injection of an additional €60 million over the €340 million announced last August.
For full-year 2010, Sky Deutschland added a total of 183,000 subscribers, which was 2.5 times above the 2009 net subscriber growth. Both the quarterly annualised churn rate (11.8% vs Q4 2009: 21.0%) and the 12-month rolling churn rate (16.2% vs Q4 2009: 21.6%) went down to the lowest levels in 21 quarters. Sky Deutschland expects an average revenue per user (ARPU) for Q4 of approximately €30, which would be at the highest level in the company’s history.
Sky HD added 133,000 HD subscribers during Q4. The HD penetration amongst Sky subscribers was 22.4% at the end of Q4, double that of Q4 2009. For full-year 2010, Sky Deutschland added a total of 325,000 HD subscribers. With 12 “true HD” channels, Sky Deutschland claims to be the market leader in HD in Germany and Austria.
The EBITDA loss for full year 2010 is expected to be at the lower end of the previously communicated range (currently expected to be between €260 and €270 million).
Commenting on the results, Brian Sullivan, CEO of Sky Deutschland, said in a statement: “While there is still much to do, we are encouraged that the initiatives we have introduced are building momentum in the business – as demonstrated both in these numbers and our current, highest ever satisfaction levels – and we remain committed to continue our unrelenting focus on content, innovation and service to deliver the best possible experience for our customers, accelerate growth and achieve sustainable profitability.”
