All but one of A1 Telekom Austria Group’s pay-TV operations in CEE saw steady growth in the year to March 31, 2018.
In the case of Belarus, thanks to the acquistion of Garant (Gomel), the company’s susbsidiary velcom ended Q1 with 258,900 subscribers or 74.9% more than a year earlier.
Elsewhere, the pay-TV subscriber base grew by 2% to 488,100 in Bulgaria, 3.8% to 213,900 in Croatia and 1.5% to 54,200 in Slovenia, while in Macedonia it fell by 0.3% to 123,500.
Meanwhile, in A1 Telekom Austria’s home market, the number of pay-TV subscribers grew by 4.1% to 302,000.
In its latest set of results, the company notes that in the case of Slovenia, in the fixed-line sector TV content has become a major differentiation factor as some commercial TV channels have changed from a FTA to fixed-line-only distribution, for which customers now need to pay.
In Bulgaria fixed-line service revenues increased thanks to the launch of an exclusive sports TV package in Q1 2017.
In Croatia, the fixed-line business has profited from the acquisition of Metronet, which was consolidated in February 2017.
A1 Telekom Austria Group had total revenues of €1,075.9 million in Q1, or 1.2% more than in the same period last year, and EBITDA was up by 0.2% to €341.5 million.
The net result in Q1 was €24.5 million, compared to €96.4 million in the corresponding period in 2017. It was still adversely affected by the amortisation of the brand which started and was communicated in 2017.
