Cord Cutting is Hitting Satellite TV Particularly Hard While some industry analysts will insist that cord cutting is slowing, the rate of customers giving up on traditional TV continues to set records. That said, some companies are being hit by the phenomenon harder than others. Cable operators, for example, have had it a little easier thanks to their growing monopoly over broadband and many telcos' refusal to upgrade their networks at any meaningful scale. That results in frustrated DSL users switching to cable, then taking TV bundle promos just because they're cheaper than standalone broadband.

Other pay TV providers, like Dish and DirecTV, have had a notably harder time in the cord cutting era. Dish in particular has been hit particularly hard, the company losing more than 1 million satellite TV customers in 2017, and its total satellite TV subscriber base retreating from with its base falling from 14.3 million at its peak, to its recent total of 11 million. And while Dish has offset these losses by adding Sling TV streaming video customers, these customers pay Dish a fraction of what the company's traditional TV subscribers do. AT&T and DirecTV have also been hit hard in the cord cutting era. The company lost 1.159 million linear pay TV customers last year, a combination of IPTV (formerly U-verse) and DirecTV defections. DirecTV satellite losses approached 150,000 in the fourth quarter, and while AT&T too has offset this some via DirecTV Now, they're still losing significant cash in that trade off, particularly troubling for a company that has thrown billions at megamergers to remain relevant. Dish and DirecTV lost a combined 268,000 satellite TV subscribers during the last three months of 2017. And again, because their streaming subscribers bring in less money than the traditional TV customers they're replacing, analysts aren't particularly impressed. "Dish Network and AT&T's Entertainment Group (which includes DirecTV Now) announced Q4 revenue growth of ... well, OK, their revenue growth wasn't very good, coming in at -5.4% and -3.5%, respectively," said MoffettNathanson analyst Craig Moffett. "But at least they're making money! Well, come to think of it, their EBITDA growth was pretty bad, too, coming in at -21.5% and -11.2%, respectively." While cable's monopoly is helping it buck the trend for the moment, that's not really going to be a long-term solution. Many of the people signing up for cable bundles these days are only doing so because they're penalized for buying standalone broadband. As such, many of these users are "cable TV customers" on paper, but keep their cable box unused and dusty sitting in the closet. The reality is that the rise of real video competition means that the cable and broadcast industry is simply going to make more money on TV as the market evolves. And most of them are going to try to make up for this lost revenue by making broadband more expensive, whether those price hikes come via usage caps and overage fees, sneaky fees, or good old fashioned rate increases. The reality is that the rise of real video competition means that the cable and broadcast industry is simply going to make more money on TV as the market evolves. And most of them are going to try to make up for this lost revenue by making broadband more expensive, whether those price hikes come via usage caps and overage fees, sneaky fees, or good old fashioned rate increases.







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Most recommended from 68 comments



ARGONAUT

Have a nice day.

Premium Member

join:2006-01-24

New Albany, IN 16 recommendations ARGONAUT Premium Member TV Sucks Just don't need it. JosemicT

join:2016-09-21

Bon Aqua, TN 13 recommendations JosemicT Member Price Its too expensive and too bloated with crap we don't like. Then the channels you do watch is just CRAMMED packed with commercials... Your paying out the ass for programming loaded with commercials.. No thanks. Just activate the detonation switches on them sky birds and put on a fireworks show for us!

maartena

Elmo

Premium Member

join:2002-05-10

Orange, CA 6 recommendations maartena Premium Member Diversify They saw it coming. Where cable can do some form of on-demand and have features such as "restart this program from the beginning", even if you weren't watching the channel.... Satellite as a medium isn't suited for anything on-demand. Any on-demand that Dish and DirecTV have are purely over the internet, not over satellite. So where cable might cling on to a few more customers because of such things..... Dish and DirecTV needed to diversify their business.



And so they did: Dish Network came up with Sling, and DirecTV with DirecTV Now. With people walking away from satellite, they are hoping they will walk right to their own services to retain some of the money.



Eventually.... satellite TV will probably have just a set of basic broadcast, sports and news channels, 50 channels or so.... where all the other channels will slowly transition to an on-demand type service. "Channels" and "DVR's" were the thing to have in 2010, but by 2020, they won't be the thing to have anymore.... and by 2030 the television market will probably have radically changed.

bobjohnson

Premium Member

join:2007-02-03

Spartanburg, SC 4 recommendations bobjohnson Premium Member Ergen is doing it wrong... All the spectrum squatting and cash hoarding that he's been doing for all these years Dish could have a cellular internet solution in the areas that still have no other options and they would probably bundle Sling...

SHSPVR

join:2003-12-15

Vinita, OK Asus RT-AC3100

1 edit 4 recommendations SHSPVR Member That no surprise When neither one can give us customers a top notch DVR software nor a reliable client or channel packages we want with out all other carp so it ends up being too expensive and way to many PPV, etc channel and DirecTV is the biggest joke of them all with there DVR Genie software all one has to do is visit AT&T Community Support page in the DirecTV section. mlcarson

join:2001-09-20

Santa Maria, CA 3 recommendations mlcarson Member Internet is the reason The reason that Satellite is getting hit particularly hard is that Cable is what most of the country is using for Internet. The Telco's haven't upgraded their infrastructure and the cable companies didn't have to replace their cable infrastructure to offer Internet and have constantly increased speeds with the new docsis standard. So if the average consumer has to have cable anyway for Internet, it's hard for satellite to compete on TV service alone. Satellite TV also has the disadvantage of requiring muti-year term agreements when Cable and streaming services don't.

mt999999

join:2016-06-16

East Liverpool, OH ·AT&T DSL

2 recommendations mt999999 Member Wow! I can't understand why someone would subscribe to a cable package and not USE it... just leaving the cable box sitting around. Even if the bundle saves money, I can't swallow paying for something that I'm not USING. You're telling me that they never even had a hankering to see what was on the local news, or anything? I mean, I wouldn't want to pay for a CATV subscription, but I can't justify having it in a package and not hooking the box up to my TV. It just seems so wasteful.