Mexico’s Televisa to further invest in pay-TV market in 2020

Mexican broadcaster Televisa , the world’s biggest producer of Spanish-language content, reported an MXN $2.5 billion fourth-quarter net profit on Thursday, up sharply from the year-ago period, helped by strong cable sales.

The company’s financial income for the quarter rose by over a billion pesos to reach MXN $1.7 billion , according to a statement filed with the Mexican stock exchange.

The company’s financial expenses during the same three months fell by some MXN $900 million compared to the year-ago period.

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Televisa

did not elaborate on what caused the large swings. Financial income and expenses often relate to currency exchange rates or debt .

Overall sales during the quarter rose nearly 5% to reach about MXN $28 billion , with revenue from the broadcaster’s cable unit showing the most robust growth, almost 16% higher than the fourth quarter of 2018.

That company said that was because of its pricing strategy , broadband and voice service additions , as well as the partial acquisition of Axtel’s residential business .

During the quarter, Televisa’s advertising sales were mostly flat, up by just 0.3% .

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During the year-ago October-December period , Televisa posted a net profit of MXN $56.6 million as its results were hampered by weak advertising revenue .

This year, Televisa will increase its optic fiber networks with the objective of augmenting its pay-TV market .

Salvi Folch

, Izzi’s CEO , said that the company will continue expanding its network with over 140,000 km ; 32% corresponds to optic fiber networks that currently reach over 1 5.3 million homes that can receive up to 100 MB of internet speed.

Regarding their expenses on the cable segment , Folch announced a decrease for this year.

In a conference with financial analysts , the directive said that, some years ago, they saw an opportunity in a highly-concentrated market and with a lack of alternatives in telecommunications services and also, the potential growth in the demand of broadband .

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“Hence, our cable operation launched an investment program to expand and improve the network ; this began by deploying fiber to homes and increasing the number of nodes in Mexico City ,” he asserted.

This was followed by a network update in other cities.

“Recently, in 2019, we deployed fiber to homes in Monterrey ,” said Folch .

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