Sales at SES were maintained in 2012 despite the loss of income from Germany’s analogue satellite broadcasters that finally switched off their signal in the year.
Revenue at the Luxembourg-based operator climbed 5.5% to €1,828.0 million, while EBITDA rose by 5.6% to €1,346.6 million.
Romain Bausch, President and CEO, commented: “2012 was a highly successful year for SES. As German analogue broadcasting was finally switched off, taking €108 million out of our revenue, our strong sales pipeline not only overcame this challenge, but delivered absolute top line growth”.
An overall European inventory increase through the period of 12 transponders, to 345 transponders, was delivered with the launch and entry into service of SES-5 and its Ku-band Nordic beam.
The number of utilized transponders dropped by 21 following the German analogue switch-off at 19.2 degrees East and the cable contract terminations at 23.5 degrees East, those these were partially compensated for by better utilization at other slots within the European arc.
The utilization rate in Europe at the year-end was 80.9%, compared to 90.1% at the end of 2011.
