IPTV stabilizes the pay TV market in Poland
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The number of pay TV subscribers in Poland shows stabilising trends, with a slight upward trend. The market situation is mainly determined by the increasingly important IPTV standard.
IPTV stabilizes the number of pay TV subscribers
In the last three years, the pay TV market in Poland has been showing stabilising trends in terms of volume. According to PMR’s estimates, in 2018 the number of pay TV subscribers oscillated around 10.4 million, increasing by less than 1% year on year. The stable situation on the market can be attributed primarily to the continued dynamic growth in the number of IPTV subscribers, correlated with the growing rate of investment in fiber-optic infrastructure. The churn rate for digital platforms and cable is lower than the growth of internet linear TV subscribers. This means that to some extent the market is still able to attract new users. To a large extent, this is due to the trend towards bundling TV services, mainly with fibre-optic internet access.
Net change in the number of pay TV subscribers to digital platforms / cable TV and IPTV in Poland (‘000), 2016-2018
| 2016 | 2017 | 2018 | |
| Satellite and cable television | -67 | -60 | -91 |
| IPTV | 91 | 131 | 152 |
Note: estimates.
Source: PMR, 2019
Orange sets the trends
Orange controls half of the IPTV market in Poland. In connection with the strongly promoted service packages for the Orange Love offer, which includes fibre-optic internet, the number of the operator’s IPTV customers in Q1 2019 increased by nearly 100,000 annually. At the same time, the number of paid DTH Orange services decreased by 12,000. This ultimately indicates a positive balance of all TV service customers in the operator’s base. If trends from the last few quarters continue, Orange should serve more TV customers on IPTV than on satellite in the second half of this year. Orange admits that IPTV brings the company higher revenues and better margins than paid satellite packages, the price of which is in fact strongly embedded in the integrated offer with internet access. This is mainly due to a greater propensity of optical network subscribers to purchase technologically coherent pay TV services than in the case of internet network users using a different technology. In addition, there is a greater tendency to buy premium offers, which is supported by the fact that the FTTH networks on which Orange provides IPTV are located in cities. This is where the richer customer lives.
Net change in the number of pay TV subscribers to digital platforms and IPTV in Orange network in Poland (‘000), Q1 2018 – Q1 2019
| I kw. 2018 | II kw. 2018 | III kw. 2018 | IV kw. 2018 | I kw. 2019 | |
| IPTV | 26 | 27 | 24 | 25 | 20 |
| Satellite television | 0 | -1 | -3 | -3 | -5 |
Source: Orange, 2019
