Across the video platforms of cable, IPTV and satellite, the worldwide pay-TV market is expected to reach $236 billion in revenue by the end of the year, which would be up from the $223 billion mark from last year.
Overall, ABI Research projected that the pay-TV market would continue to grow 19 percent over the next five years to reach $281 billion by 2017. On the downside, ABI said pay terrestrial TV services were losing steam, with a small drop in revenue.
The report said that cable TV would continue to hold down the largest market share through 2017, but it was losing ground to both satellite and IPTV services. The report singled out the basic video losses by North American cable operators over the past few quarters, which have been partially offset by data subscriber gains.
“Growth in satellite and IPTV services in North America comes at the expense of cable. This competitive shift, coupled with a small drop in pay-TV penetration, led cable TV revenues to fall about 1 percent in 2012, despite a small increase in ARPU. Global cable TV service revenue market share is expected to drop to 47 percent in 2012, from 48 percent in 2011,” said Jake Saunders, vice president and practice director of core forecasting at ABI.
DirecTV topped ABI Research’s global satellite TV market share ranking, both in terms of subscriber base and service revenue at the end of Q2 2012.
“DirecTV experienced ARPU growth in the United States as a result of higher penetration in premium packages; it saw significant subscriber and revenue growth in Latin America, although ARPU fell slightly as more customers chose less expensive packages,” according to Khin Sandi Lynn, research analyst at ABI.
