BSkyB claims IPTV lead

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BSkyB says it now has the UK’s largest all-IP fibre-optic network. And customers are responding, it suggested March 31 at the Goldman Sachs IPTV investor’s day. In a presentation Sky said there is a “strong response from customers”, and it now has signed up more than 1m telephony clients and 1.2m broadband customers. Sky’s telephony and broadband service is based on its “EasyNet” and suitably equipped BT exchanges, now totalling about 1200 exchanges. These cover about 70% of the UK’s population, with Sky adding that these services were “well positioned to grow”.

Public take-up is solid, with Sky’s net broadband additions beating BT, Carphone Warehouse, Virgin Media, Tiscali and Orange. On the telephony side of its business, it seems to be winning most of its customers from BT, which lost 264,000 customers in the pre-Christmas quarter, while Sky picked up a net 236,000.

Sky took the opportunity to also highlight the progress made by its Sky+ PVR technology, which in December clocked up 335m instances of viewers time-shifting programming. Sky confirmed that Sky+ is now in 35% of customer homes, with a net growth on the pre-Christmas quarter of 434,000 customers (276,000 previous year, same quarter). Sky’s presentation added that Sky HDTV customers to its 17-channel portfolio now topped 422,000 viewing homes.


Source: Rapid TV News

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