Sources: Providers, Suissedigital
The digital television market is part of a rapidly changing media landscape.
The telecommunications providers active in the digital TV market are facing growing competition because there are more and more players with combined broadband/phone/TV bundle offers and also more and more offers from streaming platforms. In addition to the most popular American giants Netflix, Disney+ and YouTube, since the end of 2022 Paramount+ (initially in partnership with Canal+) and since September 2023 with Swisscom has gained a foothold in the Swiss market. In 2023, TV streaming provider Zattoo and internet provider Init7 joined forces to launch Zattoo Home at the end of August. IPTV provider Teleboy also offers internet access in partnership with Swisscom.
Against this particular background, the telecommunications providers have recorded a decline of around 1% per year in their TV customers over the past five years. Between 2022 and 2023, this decline was 32,000 customers (-0.8%).
In addition, the Sunrise/UPC merger in 2021 significantly changed the balance of forces between the main players in this market segment although it has yet to have a significant impact on the market structure.
Swisscom has maintained its leading position, which it took from UPC in 2015, in spite of the difficult economic situation. Despite the loss of 34,000 customers in 2023 (-2.2%), Swisscom had 1.54 million digital TV subscribers; by the end of 2023, its market share had fallen slightly to 40%.
Over the same period Sunrise (incl. UPC) also lost around 17,000 customers (-1.4%), but was able to maintain its market share of 31.5%.
At Quickline, the association of a number of CATV operators, the number of TV customers decreased slightly (-2,600 or -0.9%). With almost 300,000 customers at the end of 2023, Quickline's market share remained consistent at around 8%. The market share of the other CATV operators reached about 14.5% and that of Salt 6%.
Last modification 14.05.2024