Swisscom feels the pressure of ‘saturated’ TV market

Swisscom saw its pay TV base decline slightly in the year to June in what the Swiss telco described as a market that was “saturated and highly driven by promotional offers”.

Swisscom reported 1.582 million TV customers at the end of the second quarter, down from 1.584 million at the same point last year.

At minus 0.1% the decline was smaller in percentage terms than Swisscom’s drop in broadband customers over the same period – down 1% to 2.027 million – and mobile access lines, down 1.5% to 6.169 million.

Swisscom did manage to add around 1,000 TV customers in Q2, but lost 6,000 for the first half overall. The company now has a 37% share of the overall TV market.

Swisscom did see growth in its convergence play, inOne, with this offering now accounting for 68% of mobile customers and 80% of fixed network residential broadband connections, up 8%. The telco said that 46% of customers now use a combined offer.

Facing “a saturated market environment” across all segments, Swisscom did manage to growth its post-paid mobile base by 89,000, including growth of 19,000 in the second quarter, with the vast majority of additions attributable to budget brands such as Wingo and M-Budget Mobile.

Swisscom’s Italian subsidiary Fastweb did see growth in both fixed broadband and mobile lines, up 3% and 19.6% respectively to 2.774 million and 2.188 million.

Overall, Swisscom posted revenues of CHF5.583 billion, up 2% on an adjusted basis, and EBITDA of 2.317 billion, up 2.7%.