In its quarterly report, RTL Group said it will continue to foster additional organic growth initiatives in two main areas: building video- on-demand services that attract mass audiences across all content genres, and continuing Fremantle’s push into scripted drama.
Reported RTL Group revenue increased by 2.7 per cent to €4,468 million (January to September 2017: €4,350 million), reaching a new record level despite negative exchange rate effects of €64 million. This was driven by higher revenue from Fremantle, the Group’s rapidly growing digital businesses and RTL Nederland
RTL Group’s digital revenue1 continued to show very dynamic growth, up 17.9 per cent to €660 million (January to September 2017: €560 million). This was mainly driven by organic growth at BroadbandTV, Fremantle and Videoland.
In the third quarter of 2018, reported Group revenue was up 3.6 per cent to €1,422 million (Q3/2017: €1,372 million), mostly due to higher revenue from Fremantle and the digital businesses
In winter 2018/19, Mediengruppe RTL Deutschland plans to relaunch its video-on-demand service, TV Now. The relaunch will include a new platform, additional exclusive content – namely TV Now Originals – online-first formats and also exclusive and non-exclusive third license content across all genres. An example for a TV Now Original in the fiction genre will be M – Eine Stadt sucht einen Mörder (M – A City Searches For A Murderer)
The number of paid subscribers for TV Now Plus grew by 40 per cent and it registered video views growth of 45 per cent from January to September 2018 compared to the same period last year
In the Netherlands, Videoland recorded paid subscriber growth of 119 per cent3. Total subscriber viewing time increased by 245 per cent in the first nine months of 2018, compared to the same period last year. Videoland’s strong growth was primarily driven by local original content shows such as reality format Temptation Island Vips, which was exclusively available on the subscription video-on-demand service
“In the first nine months of 2018, RTL Group once again demonstrated its position of strength – even in challenging market conditions : said Bert Habets, CEO of RTL Group.
“This is thanks to our broad international footprint and well-diversified revenue mix. Our main goal is to grow organically across our portfolio, while maintaining attractive shareholder returns.
The mixed developments of the European TV advertising markets show that we are on the right track with our clear focus on two growth areas: building and expanding our non-linear streaming platforms, and producing local exclusive content.
“We will substantially increase the content offers of our streaming services across all genres – this includes showing programmes online first and developing original productions for these services. Combined with state-of-the-art user experience, RTL Group is determined to become the European pioneer for the next level of Total Video.”
