Recently Disney + Hotstar’s ad revenue had a leap in the JFM quarter during the time of Indian Premier League (IPL) matches and the Covid- 19 pandemic, this was revealed by The Walt Disney during a conference call in Q2 earnings. This ad revenue’s degrowth affected the platform’s average revenue per user (APRU). Walt Disney’s financial calendar is set in such a way that it runs from the 1st of October to the 30th of September.
Even though it’s the present condition the platform continues to add new subscribers at a fast pace. The Disney + Hotstar comprised 1/3rd of Disney +’s 104 million users from across the world who had paid the subscribers in Q2. Disney + Hotstar had a total of 34.67 paid subscribers in Q2 when compared to the 28.47 million subscribers in Q1 for the quarter which ended by December 2020. The platform that is available in countries like India, Indonesia and Singapore had added a total number of 6.2 million paid subscribers in Q2.
According to the analysis put forward by Christine McCarthy, The Walt Disney Company’s Senior Executive Vice President and CFO “it had almost 104 million Disney + paid subscribers by the end of the second quarter”. While comparing Q1 and Q2, Disney + Hotstar is the biggest contributors to the net subscribers as it makes one-third of the total Disney + Hotstar subscriber base by the end of their second quarter.
They had really low revenue during their first quarter due to the pandemic and the IPL matches. The current matches were taking place in the 3rd quarter but it was suspended last week due to Covid – 19 spread. We aim to achieve our fiscal by 2024 from 230 million to 260 million subscribers with an addition of 30 million paid subscribers in the first half of the year.
Around half of the total 60 IPL matches were expected to take place this season. We eagerly look for the 30 matches to take place and this could have an impact on advertising. One of the big issues among these is that when it overlaps with the Q4, which is expected to start by the beginning of October”.
In the second quarter, Disney’s International Channel revenue was decreased by 4% and the operating revenue increased by 27%. This was mainly driven by the lower programming cost and production costs at the same time with an increase in advertisement revenue. Here the ad revenue was increased due to the BCCI cricket matches.
Follow and connect with us on Facebook, LinkedIn & Twitter
