General : Coming Soon to Virgin Media TV (2016) Vol 2

[1andrew1]

Originally Posted by muppetman11

They are offering half price pretty much all year now funny that if everything's hunky dory like you would have us believe. How many companies would price things at half price if masses of people were chomping at the bit to get it.

Droves leaving , no just choosing to other bother with premiums or at least choosing not to pay at full price.

Sky's KPI's in areas like churn and average revenue per user have so far been very strong so their pricing strategy seems to be working for them.
Sky is also now marketing its mobile service so that should help reduce churn and help its customers save money as they trade down from more expensive providers like O2 and Vodafone.
It's also worth remembering that each year the number of houses increases, currently 200,000 a year. So every five years that's a million more households for Sky to target with hopes that the 200,000pa figure will rise.

[muppetman11]

Agreed they are a well run business although I believe ARPU has been pretty flat of late. My point still stands I just don't see Sky breaking the bank next time sure we may see a rise but nowhere near like the last set. In my opinion where we to get another surprise bidder with deep pockets I think Sky would feel confident enough to walk away.

As a platform Sky is attractive enough for any potential winner to want to host it's channels on anyway.

[RichardCoulter]

This free factual channel has just started broadcasting in 4K on satellite (not currently available to Sky Q customers due to its broadcasting standard*):

http://www.broadbandtvnews.com/2015/...nment-channel/

I wonder if VM could get this for their 4K customers to watch?

* By default, it would be an exclusive too

[1andrew1]

Originally Posted by muppetman11

Agreed they are a well run business although I believe ARPU has been pretty flat of late. My point still stands I just don't see Sky breaking the bank next time sure we may see a rise but nowhere near like the last set. In my opinion where we to get another surprise bidder with deep pockets I think Sky would feel confident enough to walk away.

As a platform Sky is attractive enough for any potential winner to want to host it's channels on anyway.

I don't think we will see a surprise bidder for the next set of rights. As you say elsewhere, Amazon may bid for sports rights in the US first and see how it gets on with those. I think the high Premier League prices make them unprofitable for most companies.
Sky's ARPU has indeed stayed at £47pm but selling Now TV subscriptions won't have helped this figure so the satellite figure is probabkly a lot higher. The mobile launch should help increase this too.

[theone2k10]

Originally Posted by RichardCoulter

This free factual channel has just started broadcasting in 4K on satellite (not currently available to Sky Q customers due to its broadcasting standard*):

http://www.broadbandtvnews.com/2015/...nment-channel/

I wonder if VM could get this for their 4K customers to watch?

* By default, it would be an exclusive too

They could but it'll cost you a extra £5p/m
Insighthd has been on SKY for a few weeks and it is not fta or ftv.

[RichardCoulter]

Originally Posted by theone2k10

They could but it'll cost you a extra £5p/m
Insighthd has been on SKY for a few weeks and it is not fta or ftv.

Oh right! Someone said it had replaced the UHD test!

There's another temporary channel on channel 100, anyone know what it is?

I presume it's a Freeview for those who don't to subscribe to it.

[bubblegun]

Originally Posted by 1andrew1

Sky's KPI's in areas like churn and average revenue per user have so far been very strong so their pricing strategy seems to be working for them.

Erm...not quite.

Last years ARPU compared with the previous year was flat.
ie they had added more customers but the ARPU hadn't increased.

Discounting was a big issue for Sky last year. They have reduced ALL discounts for ALL existing customers so the ARPU may increase this year.

Most people are joining Sky Q at full price or with lower Sports and Movies discounts which will also help.

Based on above comments, I wouldn't expect Sky to be bidding big money for Champions League rights anytime soon!

[RichardCoulter]

AIUI Sky are offering 5 years with 60% off and no contract to try and keep existing customers.

I think that new customers get 50% off and a free UHD TV.

[theone2k10]

Source says Viceland coming to vm and bt tv April 2017.

[RichardCoulter]

Originally Posted by theone2k10

Source says Viceland coming to vm and bt tv April 2017.

Talking of BT/YouView, they are going to start using cloud technology.

Im surprised that the V6 isn't doing this.

Edit: Just seen this in another thread:

Originally Posted by Ignitionnet

Dudes, this STB has cloud storage, a cloud EPG, etc. It is basically a thin client with an MPEG decoder.

Will it impact on your broadband given it uses your Superhub to connect to the network? Probably not: VM have QoS working which will ensure that VoD from the v6 will have its own bandwidth. This capability is needed as part of the voice over cable project, which is nearly sorted.

What this STB will mean is that the reliability of the broadband network has be taken care of as this guy will require 2-way communication with VM to deliver TV services.

VM / Liberty have some busy times ahead, however there are a bunch of projects in progress towards this. The old modems and really old set tops should stop working soon as the kit they connect to is retired, and the newer kit is more reliable, delivers far higher bandwidths, and will be a way better solution.

Much higher upload capacity being delivered too, both through upgrades at headends and hubsites and some network rebuilds.

[muppetman11]

Aren't pretty much all the main providers starting to introduce elements of cloud technology ?

[denphone]

Originally Posted by muppetman11

Aren't pretty much all the main providers starting to introduce elements of cloud technology ?

From what l have read that is definitely the case MM.

[Horizon]

Originally Posted by muppetman11

Aren't pretty much all the main providers starting to introduce elements of cloud technology ?

The benefit that VM has over competitors is that they have a cable tv network to pipe everything over, whereas everyone else doesn't.

How reliable will BT, Sky and Talktalk be with cloud technology driving their tv services, not forgetting they've all got to share BT's FTTC copper wires alongside broadband services? Not much, I'd suggest.

[1andrew1]

Originally Posted by 1andrew1

Sky's ARPU has indeed stayed at £47pm but selling Now TV subscriptions won't have helped this figure so the satellite figure is probabkly a lot higher. The mobile launch should help increase this too.

Originally Posted by bubblegun

Erm...not quite.

Last years ARPU compared with the previous year was flat.
ie they had added more customers but the ARPU hadn't increased.

Discounting was a big issue for Sky last year. They have reduced ALL discounts for ALL existing customers so the ARPU may increase this year.

Most people are joining Sky Q at full price or with lower Sports and Movies discounts which will also help.

Based on above comments, I wouldn't expect Sky to be bidding big money for Champions League rights anytime soon!

As per my earlier post, Sky has done very well to maintain its ARPU bearing in mind that the bulk of its new customers have been to the lower-priced Now TV service. This suggests that it has successfully grown revenue from its satellite customers through higher prices and additional services. Adding mobile services should raise the ARPU next year and only half of its customers take broadband from it so it should continue to add customers here and grow the ARPU for satellite customers.

Champions League has been shown to add customers to BT TV but its loss has not reduced Sky's customer numbers so I agree that it won't be bigging big here - just enough to make sure that BT doesn't get them for a song.

[muppetman11]

Originally Posted by Horizon

The benefit that VM has over competitors is that they have a cable tv network to pipe everything over, whereas everyone else doesn't.

How reliable will BT, Sky and Talktalk be with cloud technology driving their tv services, not forgetting they've all got to share BT's FTTC copper wires alongside broadband services? Not much, I'd suggest.

BT TV is already an IPTV service delivering SD , HD and UHD over its FTTC product. Openreach is also currently trialling G.fast which should bring higher speeds when rolled out.