Active subscribers comprise 65.42% of 94.61 mn total DTH universe

Inactive direct-to-home (DTH) subscribers grew faster than active subscribers in the July–September quarter, data provided by the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) showed. Inactive subscribers grew 5.41% to 32.71 million compared to 31.03 million in the earlier quarter. The total active subscriber base saw a 2.31% increase to 61.9 million from 60.5 million in the preceding quarter. This is based on data provided by DTH operators to TRAI. For the quarter under review, active and inactive subscribers comprised 65.42% and 34.57% of the total subscribers. The same was 66% and 34% respectively in the prior quarter. Overall, the total DTH subscriber base increased 3.36% to 94.61 million from 91.53 million in the previous quarter.

According to TRAI, the net active subscriber base includes the number of temporarily suspended subscribers who have been inactive but for not more than 120 days. During the quarter, three listed DTH operators collectively added 0.8 million (880,000) million net subscribers. While Dish TV mopped up 0.4 million new subscribers, Airtel Digital TV added 0.25 million and Videocon d2h 0.23 million net subscribers. Reliance Digital TV failed to add any subscriber during the quarter. The data for Tata Sky and Sun Direct is not public. Among DTH operators, Tata Sky had the most number of channels at 495. Sun Direct provided the least number of channels at 226. Dish TV carried the maximum number of FTA channels at 232, while Tata Sky provided the highest number of pay channels at 287. India currently has six pay DTH operators and one free DTH platform owned by Doordarshan called Freedish, which is estimated to have upwards of 20 million users. Late last year, Dish TV and Videocon d2h announced that they would merge to create a TV distribution behemoth. As of 30 September 2016, the combined subscriber base is 27.6 million. The merged entity will become the second largest DTH company in the world by subscribers, behind DirecTV (37.8 mn).