- Publisher Enders Analysis.
- Publish Date August 24, 2020
- Sector Fixed Line (Internet and Voice), Telecom, UK.
- Company

Consumer broadband, telephony and pay TV market revenue growth plummeted to -6% in Q2 (from -2% in Q1), with all of the ‘big 4’ operators’ revenue growth taking a substantial hit. The reduction in premium sports channel revenue was by far the largest factor, with there being some other lockdown-related negative factors, such as the opportunity cost effect of extra services offered for free by the operators to help their customers during the crisis
Contents
Executive Summary
Market trends and outlook
- Broadband unseasonably strong, but line rental and pay TV volumes hit
- Football (and backbook) hits revenue growth
- All operators took a substantial hit to revenue growth
- Sport, and backbook pricing, hits ARPU
- Gross adds and churn fall in lockdown, can the churn drop be sustained?
- Working-from-home boost to fixed broadband?
- Operator financial performance very mixed due to business mix
- New customer pricing sustains lockdown recovery
- Out-of-contract notifications start to hit, and annual notifications loom
- An end in sight for bumper existing customer price rises?
- Ultrafast to the rescue?
- Q2 2020 trends: broadband actually accelerates, Virgin Media the main beneficiary
- High speed broadband adoption slows due to lockdown effects
- Q2 2020 trends: sharp drop in line rental due to stalling installations
- Q2 2020 trends: pay TV also hit by lockdown
Appendix
List of charts/tables
Market net additions
RGU and subscriber growth
RGU ARPU, volume and revenue growth
Subscriber ARPU, volume, and revenue growth
Average RGU growth by operator
Consumer revenue growth by operator
Subscriber ARPU growth
RGU ARPU growth
TalkTalk gross adds and churn during the lockdown
Broadband churn
Smartphone-only household penetration (%)
Workers wanting to work remotely post COVID-19
Financial performance and outlook
Broadband entry-level pricing, new customers (£/month)
Broadband high speed pricing, new customers (£/month)
Contract status of customers by provider
Proportion of revenue at risk if OOC customers switched to ...
Existing customer pricing changes
Gigabit-capable premises covered (m)
Full fibre pricing and (discounted) wholesale cost, £ per month
Broadband organic net adds (000)
Broadband organic subscriber growth
High speed net adds (000)
High speed penetration of broadband bases
Line rental net additions (000)
Line rental subscriber growth
Pay TV net additions (000)
Pay TV subscriber growth