Canal Digital Cable HD success

Canal Digital Norway has achieved a 30% penetration of HD receivers in cable households from a standing start 12 months ago. It follows the cable and satellite pay-TV operation’s move to include HD channels as part of its overall proposition, rather than charge an additional fee for an HD tier.
HD was less favourable in satellite households but still reached 12% of the 539,000 Norwegian DTH subscribers at December 31, 2008. Multiroom was in 24% of households, up from 11%.

Across the four countries of Denmark, Finland Norway and Sweden, where Canal Digital services are available, there was a 15% HD decoder penetration. This represents a shift of 11 percentage points between December 2007 and December 2008. Multiroom is also on the rise, with a 9% pp increase to 20% of subscribing households.

The move, combined with an increase in general monthly subscription fees, saw an increase in ARPU from NOK275 to NOK304 (€31.2 to €34.6) in DTH households and from NOK179 to NOK206 among cable TV households.

However, the competitive market where new entrant IPTV platforms are vying for attention with free and pay digital terrestrial television services have put overall subscriber numbers under pressure. Cable TV numbers climbed year-on-year by 41,000 to 746,000, but DTH fell back from 1,131,000 to 1,113,000. Increases in Norway compensated in part for falls in Denmark.
Another high spot has been the increase in the number of Norwegian cable subscribers taking broadband internet. The service represented 34% of the installed base at the end of 2008, as opposed to 25% one year earlier.

Overall, Telenor Broadcast reported a 14% increase in fourth quarter revenues achieving NOK2,160 million in revenue on EBITDA of NOK389 million.

Revenues in the Canal Digital Group came in at NOK1,690 million, where higher sales and marketing expenses put pressure on EBITDA, which fell to NOK121 million against NOK128 million in Q4 2007.

Transmission and Encryption increased its revenues from NOK530 million in Q4 2007 to NOK602 million in 2008 as the segment benefitted from the increased capacity on the Thor 5 satellite and the best ever quarter from the conditional access provider Conax.

Canal Digital pay-TV subscribers (’000s)
Denmark     Finland     Norway     Sweden
DTH    177    54    539    343
(198)    (57)    (522)    (353)
DTT    0    35    0    0
-    (52)    -    -
SMATV    684    49    121    267
(662)    (54)    (159)    (278)
CATV    35    0    476    235
(32)    -    (431)    (242)
IPTV    0    0    0    5
-    -    -    (3)

December 31, 2008
Source: Telenor

Canal Digital CATV internet subscribers (000s)
2006    2007    2008
Denmark    14    15    21
Norway    73    108    164
Sweden    4    4    3

December 31, 2008
Source: Telenor