Comcast reported the numbers throwing around percentages willy-nilly. I read the press release and came up with the following:
Basic subscribers: 24.4 million (down 147,000 from prior quarter) Digital (but not advanced) subscribers: 9.381 million (56% of 16.752) Advanced subscribers: 7.370 million (44% of 16.752) --combined digital non-advanced and advanced were up 417,000 over prior quarter Comcast has a total of (24.4+16.8) = 41.2 million cable subscribers --set top boxes number doesn't line up since some digital subscribers have more than one digital set-top box Not sure I follow Rob's logic regarding analog (basic) attrition. With the digital TV transition Comcast plans to aggressively promote Basic cable to current OTA (over-the-airwaves) TV users, so that will - over the short term - boost the basic vs digital ratio. I haven't looked at demand substitution assumptions for analog vs. digital cable to sort out when the analog market share reaches a low, near-zero asymptote. While studies have shown that demand substitution for a variety of technology products -- the traditional "S" or "Fischer-Pry" curve -- is happening quicker as technologies advance (e.g. DVD vs VCR, CD vs LP/Cassette), I haven't read prognostications regarding analog cable. Comcast acknowledges that, as the incumbent provider, it expects to lose share to other TV alternatives (phone company FTTH [e.g. Verizon FiOS], satellite TV, web-delivered TV [not specifically Internet Protocol-delivered TV])) Richard Cuff / Allentown, PA USA On Thu, Oct 30, 2008 at 11:10 AM, Kevin Anderson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > Rob, > Your percentages (if they are yours) don't add up. I add up a total of > 51.806 million Comcast cable TV customers. The analog (basic) only customers > would be 47 percent of the total. While less than half, it is still close to > half. A quarterly loss of only 147,000 is still only a loss of 0.6 of 1 > percent of the basic subscription rate. I don't consider that to be that > rapid of a loss. Losing 600,000 in one year (four times the quarterly loss) > is still not that huge of a drop. Although a loss is a loss as trends go. > _______________________________________________ Swprograms mailing list [email protected] http://montreal.kotalampi.com/mailman/listinfo/swprograms To unsubscribe: Send an E-mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED], or visit the URL shown above.
