© 2010 Rapid TV News
Sue Tabbitt ©RapidTVNews | 29-07-2010
BT signed only 14,000 subscribers to its hybrid DTT/IPTV service, BT Vision, during the second quarter of this year, giving a total of just 481,000 paying customers.
The British communications giant is now pinning its hopes on its tie-up with Sky Sports, whose channels are due to launch on the service next quarter.
Other more positive news included the achievement of BT’s first major milestone in its fibre rollout. The company now covers more than 1.5m premises with its high-speed network, adding around 100,000 new premises each week. BT has some 4,000 cabinets ready to provide fibre-based broadband services, with 135 exchanges now accepting orders.
ARPU for the second quarter of this year was £314, up £5 from the previous quarter, boosted by a growing take-up of broadband services. BT added 96,000 new broadband customers in the quarter to June, commanding 40% of the UK retail broadband market. Although quarterly revenues from across BT’s business were £5,006m, down 4% compared to the same period last year, pre-tax profits grew 17% to £446m.
Under the Sky alliance, BT is offering its broadband customers access to one of the two sports channels at an initial price of £6.99 per month.
