Once very distinct types of companies, cable operators and telecommunications groups are growing increasingly indistinguishable - at least in the fixed market - as bundling and product upsell heads towards its natural conclusion.
In 2005, the average cable company made 76% of its revenue from subscription television products - just 24% was derived from either broadband or telephony subscriptions. By the end of 2017, the mix between TV and non-TV revenues will have reached nearly 50:50 - with broadband (helped by cable's natural speed advantage over DSL) rapidly closing on TV. By contrast, back in 2005, fixed telephony filled the 'TV role' for telecoms groups, representing 71% of telco retail revenue (75%+ once recent acquisitions of satellite TV providers such as DirecTV are excluded). By the end of 2017, we expect that the contribution of fixed telephony will have dropped to less than a third of overall telco fixed retail revenue. TV has risen to near parity, and Ampere expects that within three years will be a more important business for telecoms groups than fixed phone.
At this point - and aside from the obvious network-level distinctions - the main difference between telcos and cable companies will lie outside the fixed sector, in mobile telephony, an area that cable companies are increasingly turning their eyes to.
As SVoD services look to gain traction in markets with under-developed fixed infrastructures, zero-rating and mobile partnerships will be crucial to their success.
Key Subscription Video-on-Demand (SVoD) players are pushing for an edge on their competitors by increasing their array of “Exclusive” and “Original” content. Netflix and Amazon are at the forefront of this move and over the past 12 months, Netflix’s “Originals” and “Exclusive” catalogue has more than doubled in size, while Amazon’s has grown by nearly three-fold.
As Netflix cancels an increasing number of its Originals, Ampere investigates the cost-effectiveness of the cancelled vs renewed titles.
Ampere investigates AMC Networks' ad-free OTT move for its domestic flagship channel, which is shifting it into the realm of premium channels.
Following a partnership with NTT DoCoMo in Japan, digital media group Vice is looking to expand its subscription video-on-demand services into more territories.
TV operators in the Western world offer a greater proprtion of sports channels, which is perhaps due to the wider range of sports for which rights deals exist in these regions.
Following Verizon's acquisition of Yahoo!, Ampere investigates its planned virtual Multiple Systems Operator (VMSO) launch.