Mumbai: Dish TV India Ltd has reported its third-quarter fiscal 2022 results on Monday. The company reported operating revenue of Rs 7107 million for the quarter ended 31 December 20201. Its subscription revenue stood at Rs 6459 million, EBIDTA was Rs 4260 million and profit after tax was Rs 802 million.
The company paid off debt of Rs 1031 million during the quarter with the resultant interest expense coming down by 57.9 per cent on a year-on-year basis. It had a closing debt of Rs 4535 million at the end of the quarter.
In the third quarter, Dish TV India ramped up gross acquisitions to almost pre-pandemic levels, though continued dependence on exclusively internal funds restricted the ability of the business to go all out thus keeping net additions under pressure.
“Consumers typically tend to step up spending during festivals with the season traditionally accounting for the majority of the annual revenues of businesses,” said the statement. “Expecting a similar trend and considering the earlier subdued demand due to repeated waves of the pandemic, Diwali 2021 witnessed aggressive marketing by consumer-focused companies. While higher marketing spends did help generate incremental acquisitions, consumer spending went below par once the pent-up demand was exhausted. Early cases of the third wave of the pandemic in mid-December too had a negative effect on consumption.”
During the quarter, Dish TV India took a price hike of around 25 per cent on both its standard-definition and high-definition hardware. “With rural stress and inflationary pressures, price-sensitive customers at the bottom of the pyramid remained vulnerable to churn to the free DTH platform. Streaming platforms, as well as content bundling by telecom players, continued to give competition to DTH service providers,” said the statement.
“As a category, DTH has been facing competition at various levels however the platform has the unique strengths that will continue to set it apart from other video platforms,” said Dish TV India Limited group CEO Anil Dua. “We remain committed to offering the best solution to our subscribers, be it in the linear or OTT space and hope to change the game with innovative offerings and winning partnerships.”
The Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (Trai), on stakeholders’ request, recently extended the deadline for enforcing the new tariff order (NTO) 2.0 to 1 June from the earlier fixed deadline of 1 April.
“The DTH industry has been working on the implementation of the new tariff order (NTO) keeping in mind the earlier deadline however the extended timeline will give us even more time to sort out any migration issues,” said Dish TV India Limited CMD Jawahar Goel. “We would also be watching the developments on the litigation front while simultaneously working towards implementation of the order.”
