January 25, 2016
Sky will unveil its pricing structure for its new SkyQ Ultra-HD set-top box during its latest quarter’s results announcements on January 29th.
Analyst reports suggest the new ‘all in’ pricing model will start above the current £90 per month for Sky’s all-embracing top-level sports & movies bundles.
Equity analysts at investment bank Nomura suggested to clients that “If it follows previous product launches, such as HD and connected boxes, then box costs could cause initial downgrades.” However, it tempered its comments by saying that quick [financial] returns would follow.
Deutsche Bank, in a note to clients, said: “Sky Q should be margin accretive. More importantly, selling more services into the base, not chasing subscriber growth means [customer] acquisition costs are falling.”
However, there’s a potential problem for Sky in particular with its German sibling. The weekend saw a report that the German cartel office is looking to split the broadcast TV rights of the important Bundesliga football coverage. The reports say the cartel office is looking for a restructuring of the way the TV rights are sold. Sky Germany currently pays €486 million per season for its ‘all rights’ (TV, cable, web, mobile and IPTV) exclusivity. These rights expire at the end of the 2016-2017 season.
