Mumbai: Dish TV India has reported its results for the fourth quarter and the financial year ended on 31 March 2022. The company reported operating revenue of Rs 2,802.5 crore for the financial year and Rs 642.7 crore for the fourth quarter.

Subscription revenues stood at Rs 2,531.1 crore for the year and Rs 574.8 crore for the quarter. Profit before exceptional items and tax stood at Rs 272.7 crore for the year and Rs 41.8 crore for the quarter.

The exceptional items for the quarter and fiscal year 2021-2022 include Rs 203.0 crore as an impairment charge on intangible assets under development and related advances Rs 1,616.9 crore and Rs 717.7 crore respectively, as an impairment charge on the goodwill and intangible assets acquired from Videocon d2h in 2017-18 and Rs 116.3 crore recognised as foreign exchange fluctuation loss due to the ongoing economic crisis in Sri Lanka.

The company continued to deleverage its balance sheet for the fourth year in a row and paid off Rs 434.3 crore during the year thus reducing its overall debt to Rs 375.6 crore at the end of fiscal 2022 as compared to fiscal 2021, which was at Rs 809.9 crore.

The company reported a loss after including exceptional items and tax of Rs 1,867.23 crore for the year and Rs 2,031.99 crore for the quarter.

Management analysis

As per the management analysis, the fourth quarter and fiscal 2022 saw the expansion of the viewers’ slate of content. The company offers over 850 plus channels in the linear space and 40 odd big & small OTT platforms offering movies, TV shows and web series. The time spent watching content per user per day went up to 4.5 hours compared to 3.6 hours in 2018.

Businesses across sectors in distribution or content are facing reducing customer stickiness, falling subscriber numbers and a perpetual capex (capital expenditure) cycle.

The direct-to-home (DTH) industry in India has been running the capital expenditure treadmill to increase the number of paying subscribers but, competition from streaming platforms, free-to-air government-run distribution platforms, telcos, cable TV and intermittent undercutting within the industry itself, has been either churning subscribers or intensifying capex or both, said the statement.

Dish TV India recorded 3.4 per cent higher new additions during the year but remained vulnerable to shifting viewing habits which continued to influence the recharge behaviour of its subscribers. The quarter also witnessed lingering effects of the pandemic related weakness in consumer sentiment with global geo-political developments and resultant inflationary spikes worsening buyer confidence. High churn resulted in a net reduction in the subscriber base during the quarter.

Dish TV India group CEO and executive director Anil Dua said, “Pay-TV consumer sentiment has been oscillating between indulging in content to sometimes being frugal with it. Consumers have been choosier than ever, often moving between linear and streaming content, as a result renewing their subscriptions less regularly. Dish TV values customers’ changing tastes and preferences and is working towards adapting to and leveraging these emerging trends.”

Dish TV India’s OTT platform Watcho crossed the 50 million downloads mark at the end of the quarter increasing its presence by 25 million during the year.

“These are challenging yet exciting times and we are reviewing everything that has existed for years. We are actively looking beyond our contemporary offerings of hybrid boxes and OTT platform Watcho, and are working towards new ways to serve our valued subscribers, both existing as well as new,” he added.

Dish TV India chairman and managing director Jawaher Goel said, “Competition is always good for the growth of any industry, what is important though is that there should be a level playing field. Pay channel procurement which is subject to strict regulations for the pay-TV sector is under forbearance when it comes to broadcaster owned channels being streamed on their own OTT platforms. This is despite cross-holding restrictions that prevent broadcasters from getting into distribution. Moreover, within pay-TV, DTH is the only business which is subject to a license fee payable to the government. As we work towards keeping up with the times, we also hope that a common licensing regime and forbearance over excessive regulation will be the norm going forward.”