Sky devolves itself of ITV

It certainly didn't take Sky long to offload its stake in ITV following last week's ruling and has chosen to sell 10.4 per cent of the commercial broadcaster, the minimum amount that a 2008 government ruling had laid down.

Back in 2006,the stake was always regarded as a long term investment and a way of ensuring that ITV did not succumb to any other takeover big.

Sky will probably argue that both of those criteria have been reached

Sky's profits continue to soar and maybe in 3D

Reporting pre tax profits of £358m for the half year,a bullish BskyB has announced that on the back of its high definition service,it has attracted 172,000 net new customers in the second quarter of the year.

At the top end of expectations,Chief Executive Jeremy Darroch says that "It has been another good quarter in what remains a tough environment, with more customers joining Sky and strong demand across our entire product range,"

Adding to the new product range,the company has also announced that this Sunday across 9 pubs in Manchester and London it will launch the first broadcast of 3D sport with the Arsenal v Manchester United game.

Customers will be given special 3D glasses to enhance their viewing experience.

A gimmick? Well Sky believes not as it prepares to launch a 3D dedicated channel in the spring which will offer a life premiership match every weekend with movies,documentaries and entertainment and art to follow.

Video on demand and advertising on demand for Sky

It appears that Sky are rolling out targeted advertising on its online video platform, Sky Player.

According to New Media age,

Sky AdSmart will target subscribers with pre- and mid-roll ads around on-demand content based on their postcode, TV package and information from third parties

,adding that

In an email to subscribers sent today, Sky read, “In future, the advertising you see on Sky Player may be better tailored to your interests. The new system, which is called Sky AdSmart, uses customer information to replace some general adverts with ones which we believe to be more relevant to viewers’ potential preferences and interests.”

Sky closes its unproductive web pages

An interesting decision from Sky yesterday as it revealed that it would be shutting down part of its web site after a review of its online presence.

As Media Guardian reports

The axed websites – money & property, dating, careers, stars, life & style, MyKindaPlace and Monkeyslum – have been hit by the advertising downturn. They account for less than 0.5% of the total inventory on Sky.com, according to the company.

The company says that it will focus instead on its more profitable sites

Is there room for more than UK sports pay channel?

Probably not is the answer as yesterday saw the final demise of the UK arm of Setanta after weeks of lurching from crisis to crisis.

Subscribers hoping to watch the channels were left facing a blank screen.

Another victory for Sky then who saw of ITV digital's attempts to broadcast football to the masses earlier in the decade?

The jewel in the Crown for any pay TV operator is the English Premier League.It was the deal that gave Sky its first shot in the arm and unfortunately other sporting events, whilst complimenting the Premier League coverage are not crowd pulllers on their own.

Setanta,a modestly successful Irish broadcaster saw an opportunity to encroach on Sky's domain when the powers that be took away the monopoly of Sky and Setanta initially won two out of the six packages.

They were though the second tear games,broadcst for the most part on Saturday teatime or Monday night leaving Sky with the showpiece events.

That was not enough to draw people to the service.Even US PGA golf,FA Cup coverage and the IPL failed to push subscriber numbers up to the required 1.9m.

When Sky won back one of the packages,it was the beginning of the end.Now 200 jobs and £450 million of investors money is at stake.

ESPN is running to take over the mantle,having already secured Setanta's premier league rights.

But surey for it to work it must form alliances with Sky?

Sky and Virgin end their battle

So the spat between Virgin and BskyB is at an end.

Hostilities broke out over 18 months ago and it all got very silly when Virgin stopped carrying some of Sky channels.

The row began when Sky decided to charge Virgin twice as much as previously to carry its channels.It what came to be seen as a standoff between Richard Branson and Rupert Murdoch,Virgin retaliated by simply taking the Sky channels off its service.

Details of the settlement have remained confidential although as Paid content points out

But it's likely Sky will have had to accept less than it wanted first time around. The loss of Virgin's 3.5 million TV customers was never in the interest of Sky's advertisers - now the ad recession is biting, Sky needs to offer them as much reach as possible.

.

The FT reports that

Channels that Virgin developed to fill the gap will continue on its own platform, and will also be carried on the satellite broadcaster until June 2011, under the terms of the resolution.
Jeremy Darroch, chief executive of BSkyB, added: “This is great news for Sky and Virgin Media customers alike. We want our channels to be enjoyed by as many people as possible so we’re delighted to secure their return to the Virgin Media platform.”

Sky soaring in the broadband market

This mornings FT reports on the good news for Sky's penetration in to the UK broadband market.

Sky has taken the broadband market by storm since it began offering Internet access two years ago. It has signed up 1.6m customers, and become the fifth-largest broadband company.

Furthermore its ambitions are to continue to grow and

Delia Bushell, Sky's director of broadband and telephony, is confident that the company will hit its target of 3m broadband customers by 2010.
Her view is based on Sky's advantage in being able to sell broadband to its 8.9m pay-TV customers.

In a maturing market this is good news for the Murdoch company especially as its rivals Tiscali,Car Ware house and Virgin media are all struggling.

In fact the only thing that could wrong for the Company is related by Diane Morrison over at Paid Content.She sees

The one thing that could hurt BSkyB is if Ofcom’s investigation into the pay-TV market eventually ends up with Sky being forced to make its premium content available at regulated rates to its rivals.

Contrasting fortunes at Sky and Trinity

Two contrasting fortunes for media Companies this morning.

Sky continues to prosper announcing revenues that are up 9% and more importantly increases in subscribers up 92,000 at 8.98m.This in turn puttng 115on subscription revenues for the period.

Sky's CEO Jeremy Darroch said after the results

"We have continued to grow strongly in a more difficult consumer environment. More customers are choosing Sky for a broader range of products and are staying with us for longer," While there is much uncertainty around the consumer environment, there remains good headroom for profitable growth in our core sectors. We are well equipped to meet customers’ demands for quality, choice and value; and we have a strong financial model to deliver growth and returns."

Over at Trinity Mirror meanwhile its half year revenues fell 8% based on plumetting advertising revenues.However it operating losses were trimmed back due in mai to the stringent costcutting across the companies 100+ locala nd regional papers.

Its Ceo Sly Bailey saying

The numerous actions we took during the period to reduce our costs and improve our efficiency, product portfolio and balance sheet have served to partially offset the impact of the serious downturn in advertising expenditure being experienced by consumer-facing media businesses.”

A small price to pay for BSkyB

The decision by the government to force the broadcaster to sell its share in Itv from 17.5 % to below 7.5% may ,on reflection, not be a bad piece of business for the Murdoch clan.

Although it is estimated that if they sell at the present time they could lose up to £300m,that is waht is cost them to keep Virin Media at bay.In the long term it could be seen as a good bit of business.

Guardian media reports that

ITV said today that it "warmly welcomed" Hutton's decision, which was widely expected following the commission's ruling.
"We believe this decision is in the best interests of the overwhelming majority of our shareholders," the company said in a statement.
BSkyB said: "The company will give careful consideration to the announcement and confirm any further steps in due course.