True focuses on boosting ad revenue
Pay-TV operator TrueVisions expects high growth in combined advertising fees and sponsorship revenue, saying it could make up half of total revenue in the next few years - up from the present 12 per cent, following its partnership expansion to cover cable
True Corp chief executive officer Suphachai Chearavanont said that TrueVisions changed its business model to focus more on boosting advertising revenue by expanding viewers via the partnership after previously relying mainly on monthly subscription fees. The latter currently contributes about 88 per cent of total revenue.
Late last week it forged a partnership with Cable Thai Holding (CTH) to expand its viewer base through CTH’s more than 300 cable-TV operators in the provinces. Under the partnership, subscribers of CTH member companies will get free access to nine exclusive channels from TrueVisions, including True Explore, Travel Channel Thailand, Siam Sport TV, Star Soccer TV, True Sport International, and Speed Channel. The service will be launched next month.
TrueVisions’ top advertising charge is around Bt10,000 per minute for advertising on TV programmes in its network, while the average advertising rate of local cable-TV operators is Bt2,500 per minute.
TrueVisions chief commercial officer Ongard Prapakamol hopes that the advertising rate for the CTH local cable-TV network will increase in the future after it gets more varied programmes from TrueVisions and other partners to offer to viewers.
TrueVisions is also keen to have a similar partnership with PSI Holding, the largest manufacturer and trader of satellite-TV receivers.
The partnership with PSI was launched early last week to offer a new box that accesses free-to-air services, providing about 200 channels, including some exclusive TrueVisions channels. PSI hopes to sell at least 300,000 of the new boxes by the end of the year.
TrueVisions has around 1.6 million pay-TV subscribers, while the CTH member network has a combined 3.5 million cable-TV subscribers. PSI, meanwhile, has sold about 10 million satellite dishes over the past 20 years.
In the second quarter this year, TrueVisions’ service revenue increased 1.6 per cent year-on-year to Bt2.4 billion, mainly from higher advertising revenue, which offset declining subscription revenue. Advertising revenue increased 46 per cent year-on-year and 29 per cent quarter-on-quarter to Bt208 million.
CTH chairman Wichai Thongtang said CTH had opened free for partnership. It was also interested to talk with content providers, including TrueVisions, RS, and Grammy, to get them to broadcast popular international sports content on CTH’s cable network. CTH was also keen to buy some Premier League matches in the new season from TrueVisions to broadcast on its network.
TrueVisions, CTH, and other major entertainment giants have already entered the bidding process for the right to broadcast English Premier League games in Thailand from 2013-2016. The price-bidding stage will start in October. TrueVisions’ existing three-year broadcasting rights for the Premier League is due to expire next year.
