16th Video Competition Report Shows First Full-Year Decline in MVPD Video Subs

Multichannel video programming distributors' video subscribership showed the first-ever full-year decline between the end of 2012 and the end of 2013, the FCC said in its 16th Video Competition Report, released Thursday. Between year-end 2012 and year-end 2013, the number of MVPD video subscribers dropped from 101 million to 100.9 million households, the report said. Cable sub numbers fell from 56.4 million to 54.4 million, while direct broadcast satellite subscribership increased from 34.1 million to 34.2 million. Telephone MVPD video numbers increased from 9.9 million to 11.3 million subscribers, the report said. MVPDs have been increasing video revenue partly by raising the price of video service, but data in the report suggests “that programming expenses are rising faster than revenue,” the report said. MVPD programming expenses were 44.6 percent of MVPD video revenue in 2013, the report says. Fifty-seven percent of the total footprints of the top eight cable MVPDs had transitioned to digital by the close of 2013, the report said. In broadcast TV, the number of stations broadcasting in HD was down slightly at the start of 2014, from the previous year, from 1,536 stations to 1,517, the report said. The number of houses relying exclusively on over-the-air broadcast increased from 11.2 million households in 2013 to 11.4 million households in 2014, the report said: “The percentage of all households they represent has remained steady at 9.8 percent.” Broadcast industry revenue “rose to $24.6 billion in 2012 from the $21.6 billion in 2011, but were reported to fall to $24.2 billion in 2013,” the report said. The data also shows viewing of online video distributors' content on multiple devices becoming more prevalent, the report said, with more than 53 million U.S. households watching online programming with at least one Internet-connected device. During Q4 2013, 12.8 percent of video streams were viewed on smartphones, up from 7.2 percent during Q4 2012, the report said. The report is “filled with good news," said Commissioner Ajit Pai in a statement attached to the report. “When it comes to video programming, Americans have more choices than ever before.”