Pay-TV penetration continues to climb in Portugal, with 94.2% of households subscribing to services as of the end of the first half.
This, according to data published by the regulator ANCOM, was five percentage points more than in the same period last year. The growth was down to not only an increase in the number of accesses but also the statistical effect of the decrease in the number of classic families (-1.9%).
As of the end of June, 4.3 million subscribers were registered, 147,000 more (+3.5%) than in the same period of the previous year, of which 3.8 million are residential customers, 89.5% of the total; and 450,000 are non-residential subscribers, 10.5% of the total. FTTH was a driver, with more than 300,000 subscribers (+14.8%) a year earlier and amounting to 2.3 million subscribers. FTTH accounted for 54.4% of subscribers, followed by cable (30.1%) , satellite (10%) and ADSL (5.5%).
At the end of the H1, MeoO was the provider with the highest share of pay-TV subscribers (40.4%), followed by Grupo Nos (38.2%), Vodafone (17. 8%) and Nowo (3.4%). Vodafone and Meo were the providers that, in net terms, attracted the most subscribers compared to the same period last year, with their shares increasing by 1.1 and 0.5pp, respectively. The shares of Grupo Nos and Nowo decreased (-1.2 and -0.3 pp respectively).