BSkyB Q1 2011 Results Show Resilience

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PayTV platform BSkyB continues to deliver recession-busting financial performances. Its latest results, for Q1 2011, show that the company added 51,000 new customers, bringing its overall customer base to 10.1m. Impressively, the company added 189,000 new Sky+ HD customers, bringing its total HD base to 3.7m, up 47% year-on-year.

Sky has also done well in terms of broadening its proposition, adding 155,000 new broadband customers and 159,000 telephony customers. Altogether, 26% of its subscribers take TV, telephony and broadband from Sky.

Continued efforts to squeeze more value from customers meant ARPU (average revenue per user) was up 8% year-on-year. Also encouraging is an increase in ad revenues, largely due to the acquisition of Living TV’s channel business.

Sky CEO Jeremy Darroch called the results "another good performance in what has clearly been a tough consumer environment". He cited the positive impact of revenue diversification – but also stressed the impact of Sky’s investment in TV: "2011 is shaping up to be our best year yet on screen. Our new channel, Sky Atlantic, has got off to an excellent start with 10m viewers in the first two months. Alongside Sky 1 and Sky Living, it is part of an outstanding line-up that will bring even more value to customers, including a growing commitment to UK drama & comedy."

In terms of headline financial figures, the nine months ending March 31 saw Sky revenue rise 14% to £4.8bn. EBITD was up 10% to £1.03bn in the same period.