Sky’s revenue growth under Comcast appears to have accelerated since it last reported as an independent company, largely driven by sports rights expansion in Italy, which also drove bumper subscriber growth in Q3 2018 


Sky UK likely enjoyed a steadier performance, helped by accelerating high speed adoption, a price rise in April, increased international sales, and improving premium channel adoption on third-party platforms


Comcast expects continued acceleration into 2019, with profitability taking a hit from increased sports rights in Italy in H1, but this is more than compensated for by reduced English Premier League rights costs in H2
 

Just three players now account for most French broadband connections: Orange’s DSL market share is closing on 50%, Iliad’s rose to 25% from consolidation with Alice, while SFR’s dropped to 23.7%, with Neuf’s rebrand imminent. Cable remains a minimal presence on broadband

Having acquired national broadcast TV rights for premium content, France Télécom’s Orange TV will launch on satellite on 3rd July and introduce subscription football and film and series services from August, in a first for a major European telecoms incumbent

Canal+ is entering a critical phase of growth following the recent merger with its former rival Télévision Par Satellite (TPS). Vivendi has set short term guidance targets for 2010 of 11.5 million subscriptions, turnover above €5 billion and more than doubling of EBITA from €490 million to over €1 billion. This presentation examines these targets and concludes that Canal+ will fall short of all them. In the best case baseline scenario of least competition from other pay-TV and free-to-air (FTA) services, it projects EBITA in 2010 of just €890 million