Telenet suffers slight TV downturn

Belgian cable operator Telenet reported a 1% dip in total cable TV customers in the second quarter with digital TV additions failing to offset a wider decline in analogue cable customers.

In the three months ended June 2014, Telenet’s digital cable TV user base was up 5% year-on-year to 1.53 million, while it analogue TV base was down 15% to 548,000.

In total, its cable TV customer base was 2.077 million, down from 2.097 million during the same quarter last year and from 2.082 million in the preceding quarter.

Telenet said that this quarterly decline “represented a marked improvement” compared to a net organic loss of 10,100 basic cable TV subscribers in the previous quarter.

It also said that approximately 74% of its basic cable TV subscribers now generate incremental ARPU on Telenet’s interactive digital TV platform, and that its multiscreen Yelo TV service now has 446,000 active users – up 6% quarter-over-quarter.

In the quarter revenue was up 3% year-on-year to €422.0 million, while adjusted EBITDA was also up 3% to €222.3 million.