Virgin Media grows TiVo base to 1.33 million

Virgin Media had 1.33 million TiVo customers at the end of 2012 after adding 187,300 customers to the advanced TV service in the fourth quarter.

The figure represents 35% of Virgin Media’s customer base. Overall TV customers grew by 59,900 in the fourth quarter.

During 2012, the number of customers on superfast speeds (30Mb and above) increased by 1.5m, including 419,400 during the last quarter, taking the total to 2.176m or 51% of our broadband base. Total broadband net additions in the year were 169,300, with 62,700 in the quarter compared to 30,000 a year ago. Net cable customer additions for the quarter were 42,700. Cable customer net additions of 88,700 in the full year represented a record for Virgin Media and a significant improvement on the 5,500 added in 2011.

Quad-play penetration, where a household takes all three cable products and at least one mobile phone service, increased to around 15.8% of the company’s residential cable customer base, compared to around 14.5% a year ago. Virgin Media had approximately 774,600 quad-play customers, which is up 11% year-on-year.

The strong operational performance helped nudge up Virgin Media’s revenues by 2.7% to £4.1 billion (€4.7 billion) for the year. Operating income rose by 29% to £699 million, but free cashflow fell by 4.9% to £473 million as a result of the company’s continuing investment in broadband.