BBWN Bites: Streaming, Streaming Everywhere & Too Many Things to Watch
Also today, subscription fatigue increases, the UK loves OTT, Liberty Latin America shows mobile and broadband gains and Disney details a new content bundle.
AT&T plans to debut AT&T TV, a thin-client broadband TV offering in select markets by the end of this quarter, extending the service nationwide early next year, AT&T CFO John Stephens told attendees at the 22nd Annual Oppenheimer Technology, Internet and Communications Conference in Boston today. Since the service doesn't need a truck roll to install a satellite receiver on each customer's roof, it has lower deployment costs. AT&T TV will be available via any broadband network, and will have an improved subscriber experience via an enhanced interface, improved search and in-app support, Stephens said. Since the amenity isn't reliant on line of sight, the addressable video market extends beyond satellite (and adds to improved CX), AT&T noted.
Disney will offer a new bundle -- comprised of ESPN+, Hulu and the upcoming Disney+ -- for $12.99 a month, CEO Bob Iger said during the company's earnings call. That marks a decent discount from the $18.99 it would cost subscribers to lease each offering separately. (See Disney preps a super streaming bundle .)
In an aside, 47% of consumers surveyed had "subscription fatigue" back in a May 2019 report by Deloitte. They complained about the 300 choices they faced. Could the percentage of sufferers increase in proportion to the number of choices. Guess we'll find out in May 2020.
Is it any surprise, then, that almost half (47%) of UK homes subscribe to OTT services, according to Ofcom's newly released "Media Nations" report. That's up 39% from last year, to 13.3 million people versus 11.2 million folk; several households pay for more than one streaming service, generating 19.1 million subscriptions in 2019 compared with 15.6 million last year, Ofcom found. (See Eurobites: Brits Head Online for TV Fix, second item.)
Crossing a Continent
Liberty Latin America sees broadband demand growing in its LatAm footprint, according to Q2 earnings.
Liberty Latin America reported rebased second-quarter revenue growth of 3% to $983 million and "solid" subscriber growth of 67,000 fixed -- including 44,000 new broadband subscribers -- and 44,000 mobile additions. Liberty LatAm has added about 240,000 broadband subs in the first half of 2019, said CEO Balan Nair in a statement. For the first six months of the year, revenue grew 3% to $1.93 billion.
Two satellites set off on their extra-terrestrial adventures last night: Intelsat's eponymous 39 launched from Kourou, on its first step to provide connectivity services to Africa, Asia, Europe and the Middle East. SpaceX blasted off from Kennedy Space Center in Florida at 7:23 pm EDT yesterday, carrying the AMOS-17 for Israeli satellite broadband provider Spacecom.
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— Alison Diana, Editor, Broadband World News. Follow us on Twitter or @alisoncdiana.
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Here's where you can find episode links for 'The Divide,' Light Reading's podcast series featuring conversations with broadband providers and policymakers working to close the digital divide.
As we have for the past two years, Light Reading will present our Cable Next-Gen Europe conference as a free digital symposium on June 21.
Charter has sparked RDOF work in all 24 states where it won bids. The cable op booked about $19 million in RDOF revenues in Q1, and expects to have about $9 million per month come in over the next ten years.
As we have for the past two years, Light Reading will stage the Cable Next-Gen Technologies & Strategies conference as a free digital event over two half-days in mid-March.
Launch of 2-Gig and 5-Gig FTTP tiers in 70-plus markets puts more pressure on cable ops to enhance their existing DOCSIS 3.1 network or accelerate their upgrade activity centered on the new DOCSIS 4.0 specs.
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