Sky saves the day at Comcast

Comcast managed to misplace 224,000 customers over the last three months, but this oversight was compensated for by the 304,000 net gain in subscribers which Sky brought to the party.

The cable cutting revolution might be causing some pain in the US, but in Europe, Sky is looking as strong as ever. The European premium TV leader might have seen revenues decrease by 3.3% year-on-year, but with the customer gains and EBITDA increasing 13% for the quarter, Comcast executives will be pleased with the returns this acquisition is delivering.

Total revenues for Comcast over the second quarter totalled $26.8 billion, a 23% year-on-year increase due to the inclusion of Sky, while EBITDA stood at $8.7 billion.

“Our company’s consistent, profitable growth is fuelled by our leading scale in direct customer relationships and premier content,” said Brian Roberts, CEO of Comcast.

“We now have nearly 55 million high-value direct customer relationships, including the 456,000 net additions in the second quarter, and a vast library of intellectual property and new productions that are extremely popular across generations and geographies. Our teams throughout the company continue to collaborate to make themselves and each other even stronger, and I’m excited about our growth opportunities ahead.”

Looking at the Comcast business, aside from cord cutting generation causing a bit of a headache, operations are holding strong. Broadband demonstrated growth, albeit at a slower rate, adding another 209,000 subscriptions to take the total up to 24.4 million consumer and 2 million business customers.

Although this would not be the worst earnings call to deliver to shareholders and the team did beat market expectations, it isn’t the most of comfortable positions. TV losses are going to start to weigh heavily on the business before too long, while internet subscription growth is starting to slow. The latter concern might well be heightened with more CSPs adding FWA offerings to their portfolio.