Dish Continues to Lose Pay-TV Subscribers
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Echostar XVIII, XIX and XX aren't on the calendar until 2016 at the earliest. This Wednesday, JUPITER 2 (Echostar XIX), a Hughesnet bird, changed from an Ariane 5 ECA launch to an Atlas launch in late 2016.
http://www.lockheedmartin.com/us/news/press-releases/2015/august/space-atlas-echostar.html
The DBS birds remain with Arianespace. Since there's only one Ariane 5 launch scheduled for the fourth quarter of 2015 (Arabsat-6B/Badr 7, GSAT-15 - Ariane 5 ECA (VA227)), I suppose it will come down to what happens with that launch as to whether they can fit another one in before year-end.
Only problem with the new satellites they are NOT for the American TV market.
The writing is on the wall for set top boxes, DVR's etc., All going to the cloud where they should be to serve the new internet TV services.
It's all about efficiency, no need to spend billions manufacturing something, when it can be all digital in the cloud, and you never have to clutter the landfills with out of date boxes, only makes sense.
http://www.fiercetelecom.com/story/...ostar-struggle-keep-changing-marke/2015-07-16
The writing is on the wall for set top boxes, DVR's etc., All going to the cloud where they should be to serve the new internet TV services.
It's all about efficiency, no need to spend billions manufacturing something, when it can be all digital in the cloud, and you never have to clutter the landfills with out of date boxes, only makes sense.
http://www.fiercetelecom.com/story/...ostar-struggle-keep-changing-marke/2015-07-16
"EchoStar XIX, also known as JUPITER 2, is a large, multi-spot beam Ka-band satellite that will help meet the growing demand for HughesNet®high-speed satellite internet service in North America. The satellite, built by SSL in Palo Alto, California, is designed to provide service for 15 years or longer."
I hadn't seen an update lately about E18, last I had heard it was Q4. Satellites never launch on time though.
For those who care to know the TRUTH, E18 is indeed going to 110W, here is a portion of the FCC license. http://licensing.fcc.gov/myibfs/download.do?attachment_key=1068892
Soon to be # 2 cable operator is switching to skinny bundles, SlingTV and other internet TV providers already there, Dish has no other option than to follow suit with some more desirable skinny bundles, Can it afford to make that move due to the high cost of Dish installation and sat. overhead? Will be interesting to see what happens. Will they bow down to ESPN in every bundle?? If not I look for ESPN to go OTT a lot sooner than most think.
https://deadline.com/2015/08/charter-tom-rutledge-skinny-pay-tv-bundle-1201491303/
https://deadline.com/2015/08/charter-tom-rutledge-skinny-pay-tv-bundle-1201491303/
Did you catch the part about Verizon being sued for creating "skinny bundles"? Dish acquired those rights as part of negotiations with the channel providers, and now we have Sling. Apparently the others don't have such rights to do so with their cable offering... much like Dish doesn't for its Sat product.
I vote we boycott this thread! Mods seem to refuse to use troll-be-gone. Poor ole blugrass has got in more trouble for asking TVLand to be in HD twice. If some of us older contributing members were doing this, we'd get chastised. Some aggravating newer members must have privileges? Brother-in-law perhaps?? LOL
I don't know. I think that he is adding to the conversation that we are already having. Although I think he should respond to the responses he gets in this thread ,rather than carpet bomb us with news links.
I read a two page article in the Houston Chronicle that spoke about the same stuff that Lue is posting. Pay tv is going to change because ALL of pay tv is seeing defections - I think it was like 300,000 nation wide. They are talking about Espn being offered as a stand alone service like HBO and Showtime and CBS too. VIACOM is losing subs, DISNEY/ESPN is losing subs and so on. But you know I got to thinking about this . If all these channels start offering themselves as stand alone online ott aps or services , doesn't that give the country true Ala cart?
CBS said that each new subs they get at $6.00 a sub with their online version , is now paying more for the same service that the rest of us do in bundles, making the price for their service more valuable for the company. Cord cutters and cord nevers are making the pay tv industry start to take notice. Changes are coming and I think that we will see them sooner rather than later.
In fact I am betting that DISH will start making changes to their bundles to keep some of their subs from churning. Why do you think we are getting HBO for $10.00 a month for the "Life of the DISH account", even if it might change tomorrow? I read today online ,that if DISH hadn't counted the SLING Subs in with their DISH sat subs , the losses would of been more like 154,000 this last quarter ,rather then the 81,000 reported. That was on top of the 134,000 they lost first quarter. At the rate of loses that DISH is having each quarter , I suspect we could be under 13 million by sometime next year.
I read a two page article in the Houston Chronicle that spoke about the same stuff that Lue is posting. Pay tv is going to change because ALL of pay tv is seeing defections - I think it was like 300,000 nation wide. They are talking about Espn being offered as a stand alone service like HBO and Showtime and CBS too. VIACOM is losing subs, DISNEY/ESPN is losing subs and so on. But you know I got to thinking about this . If all these channels start offering themselves as stand alone online ott aps or services , doesn't that give the country true Ala cart?
CBS said that each new subs they get at $6.00 a sub with their online version , is now paying more for the same service that the rest of us do in bundles, making the price for their service more valuable for the company. Cord cutters and cord nevers are making the pay tv industry start to take notice. Changes are coming and I think that we will see them sooner rather than later.
In fact I am betting that DISH will start making changes to their bundles to keep some of their subs from churning. Why do you think we are getting HBO for $10.00 a month for the "Life of the DISH account", even if it might change tomorrow? I read today online ,that if DISH hadn't counted the SLING Subs in with their DISH sat subs , the losses would of been more like 154,000 this last quarter ,rather then the 81,000 reported. That was on top of the 134,000 they lost first quarter. At the rate of loses that DISH is having each quarter , I suspect we could be under 13 million by sometime next year.
- Nov 29, 2003
- 15,902
- 20,387
With DirecTV and Cablevision finally reporting their 2nd Q, we are now at a 432,000 loss for this quarter compared to a 320,000 loss in the same quarter in 2014.
Things need to change, cord cutting is real and the rate is picking up and there is no growth at all, a total negative.
I am not sure skinny bundles is the only answer, I have posted before my family could get by with 15 channels, but they have to be the right 15 channels, fees need to come down or offer a cheaper box like the live only HD Pace box that Comcast offers for $2.99 a month.
Also Dish needs broadband badly, they need to partner with someone or do something with all that spectrum, but there has not been one rumor about using it except the T-Mobile one.
While Profits are up for Dish, I really think customers have hit the breaking point as far as price goes ( for DirecTV also), if they have another big price increase I really think the sub loss will accelerate big time, bundles are where it is at.
I have always wrote here if I have to choose between Broadband and a TV sub because of price I would drop TV in a second because I still get some form of TV with broadband.
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FilmOn used to have a cloud DVR option, I don't know if they still do. It was about $15-$20 per month and it was 50 or 60 hours.
There's lots of ways to look at what is happening with Dish. Yes, they lost net subs again, but they made more money off the ones that stuck around. To me that means that the good customers that buy into higher subscription levels are finding value there and have the money to afford it. And that's a good thing. And while every company likes to grow, it isn't a given that they have to. If Dish could have a net of no lost subscribers and maintain the profits, they could do quite well imo. Of course it takes a certain number of subs to keep them profitable and viable.
Those that are cutting the cord are also those that are willing to have less to watch because, as we've seen, if you try to maintain the same number of channels/shows that you want to watch the same, it will cost nearly the same with streaming subscriptions. I know, I looked seriously at it. But when I found I would need a few subscriptions, all with their own billing, the cost to me wouldn't be much less than what I'll be paying Dish when my 1st year deals wind down. And I'll have no way to watch live or even delayed, boxing and golf at all.
IOW, if I cut the cord I have to be willing to miss out on things I find enjoyable and important.
I agree with you 100%. The price of the average cable/sat bundle has reached the tipping point. Anymore increases on top of what they are already charging will just speed up the defections. That is why I see DISH trying to make smaller bundles in a way to stay some of the losses. Now how they reach that right combo of channels , I'm sure will be dictated by the channel providers like Viacom, Disney etc. Now I have said for YEARS that DISH could cut some of their losses by reducing and or ELIMINATING some of their various made up , charge them because they can DISH FEES. Will it reduce some of their profits? YES, but so will the continual loss of subs due to cord cutting and regular churn. Now in their latest promo for new subs , I see DISH has done just that. No DVR fees for two years, NO charge for HD or locals etc. PRICE locked for two years at $49.99. IF DISH would cut their dvr fees down to a reasonable amount or completely eliminate them , that might stay some of their losses for a short while,but eventually the prices that the channel companies are charging for their continual carriage will be what completely destroys the current dieing model. Eventually DISH will have to make changes or they will die, just like the rest of the cable industry.
Ala cart is what people want and they have been saying that for years. YES, You will pay more for the channels you want, but their will be no more spreading the costs and subsidizing of ESPN over all the cable and sat subs by placing them in the lowest programming packs. Sports is over priced and they need to be spun off into their own premium pack, just like the premium movie packs. If you like sports , you pay for them. If that means we end up with a whole lot of smaller niche channels going away, I'm all for it. I've said before that there is little to NO original content produced by them and mostly infomercials and reruns from nework tv. I could get by with about just my locals and about 15 channels myself. In fact if you could pay by the show , instead of the channels , I could get by with a whole lot less . If something doesn't change , the entire present day bundle will collapse in the next 5 years and there will be more buyouts, mergers till there are even less tv companies than we have today. I predict that DISH will be one of them .
Charlie has boxed himself into a corner with all his prior broken mergers and cooperation deals with various companies. His conduct in these deals has doomed DISH from working with just about all the big companies. His reputation precedes him and he is well reviled in the industry. He has all that bandwith that he will have to sell now ,since the T-mobile merger is effectively DEAD. His words not mine - due to the FCC decision to not count the discount for their purchase. With no cell phone company to partner with , DISH has no future as a sat company . If broadband starts to grow and reach the rural country , even satellite won't be needed in those areas. Now if DISH concentrates on making SLING tv the best with dvr or cloud services and makes the SLING app available on all the tvs and media streaming boxes, they might be able to segue into internet delivered media and just use the satellites and resources to pump that company up -including locals and or sports etc. But that would mean refocusing all their attention on that venture and let the present day satellite service continue to die out -and it will just like the big C-band sat service did.
The times are a changing and unfortunately DISH needs to change too , if they want to survive in some incarnation.
Here is the facts. Present day cable and satellite customers are predominantly older subs and they are getting older and dieing out. I'm 53 and have had satellite in some form since 95. The younger generation that is coming up and replacing them are not interested in this model. They want ala cart and mobile video that they can take with them. They don't want to pay over $85.00 a month BEFORE fees & taxes are added just to watch tv. As that generation continues to grow older and expand and replace the older genrations like the boomers and older ones, the demographics are not going to change. The sub base for the present day cable /sat model are literally dieing out as we speak. There are many things I have suggested in other posts that DISH could do to stay off some of the losses ,but it will not work long term. In the next 5 years the current model will collapse. DISH is hemorrhaging subs each quarter and that will continue to accelerate each quarter due to the continuing demographics I have already talked about and the continual relentless price hikes pushed by the greedy channel provider companies like ESPN, VIACOM ,etc.
Wages are stagnant in this country and technology is changing. Cord cutting & cord nevers are a reality and for a company to continue to expand their profits off the ever decreasing sub base by hiking their fees and carriage fees, is what is causing the current model to collapse. It is catch 22 with a death spiral. Eventually even the older subs will drop DISH. After all they got by with only 3 ota stations for most of their lives, they could get by with just ota and netflix ,amazon or hulu to replace their sat/cable service. IF it weren't for the nice money off promos that DISH has thrown my way for my parents and myself, they would of already dropped DISH and we would be looking at Tivo. I reached my tipping point for staying about 3 years ago. IF the money off stops , I will have to make other arrangements. I love DISH and their receivers,but I do NOT love the ever increasing prices of their programming and their various, miscellaneous, and ever increasing DISH FEES.
