Comcast Adds 5 million Peacock subscribers in Q4

(CTN News) – It is no secret that Comcast NBC’s Peacock streaming hub is taking its place in the world – but the cost of doing so is becoming increasingly burdensome.

Comcast, one of the biggest players in the television and entertainment industry, said it managed to add five million new customers to its Peacock service over the past year.

It generated significant investment to do so, despite having to deal with a slowdown in its overall broadband business and pay out severance to its employees.

There seems to be a consensus among the company’s top executives that it is worth the expense of being in streaming.

“At the end of the year, we had more than doubled our Peacock subscribers, reaching more than 20 million; we nearly tripled the revenue we earned from Peacock to $2.1 billion,” said Brian Roberts, chairman and CEO of Comcast.

According to the owner of the Xfinity cable business, as well as the NBC and Telemundo networks, revenues over the period rose just 0.7% to $30.6 billion.

This is a decrease of just 0.7% from the previous year. In the current quarter, the company earned $3.02 billion, or 70 cents a share. This compares with $3.06 billion, or 66 cents a share, in the same time period last year.

There was a 1.4% increase in revenue in Comcast’s cable division in 2014, the company’s biggest economic engine, from $15.64 billion in 2013 to $16.64 billion in 2014.

In the fourth quarter of last year, Comcast lost 440,000 video subscribers and 26,000 broadband subscribers, some of which were caused by Hurricane Ian in Florida.

There was a 6% increase in revenue for NBCUniversal during the second quarter, bringing its revenue to $9.89 billion.

A television broadcast of the 2022 FIFA World Cup, which was carried by both Telemundo and Peacock, added to the company’s coffers.

However, the investment in Peacock as well as severance expenses took their toll on the company.

In the year-ago period, NBCU had an adjusted loss of $978 million related to Peacock, which is up from a loss of $559 million in the year-ago period.

Compared to last year, Comcast’s Sky pay-TV unit had revenues of $4.4 billion, down from $5.1 billion the previous year.

SEE ALSO:

UAE’s Hotdesk Expands In Europe By buying Spain’s YADO