MTS, Stream-TV see pay TV growth

Russian service provider MTS has seen a year-on-year growth of 200,000 subscribers in its pay TV base. The operator ended the third quarter with 2.7 million pay TV customers.

MTS had 2.2 million broadband internet customers at the end of September, up 10% year-on-year.

Sistema Mass Media’s pay TV offering Stream-TV saw its subscriber base grow by 22% year-on-year to 7.2 million at the end of the third quarter. The proportion of revenue accounted for by advertising grew by 5.4 percentage points to account for 15.9%. Sistema Mass Media’s overall revenues declined by 56.3% year-on-year to US$13 million (€10 million) as a result of reduced sales of TV series at Russian World Studios.

MTS as a whole posted revenues of US$3.132 billion for the third quarter, down 4.4% year-on-year. Operating income dropped by 4% to US$829.6 million as a result of depreciation of the Russian ruble. ARPU in Russia grew by 8.7% year-on-year in local currency to RUB313 (€7.80) during the third quarter.