TalkTalk today shrugged off the European football war between bigger rivals BSkyB and BT as the telecoms group won 167,000 TV customers in the last three months.
“That’s more TV customers than BT, Sky and Virgin put together,” said chief executive Dido Harding, who only began offering a YouView internet-enabled, set-top box as a low-cost alternative to high-end rivals a year ago.
TalkTalk, which said it has been having success selling movies such as Iron Man 3 and Life of Pi on a one-off basis, should have one million TV customers by next year.
“Not everyone wants to pay a premium for TV sport,” added Harding, indicating that her customers were unlikely to be very interested in BT’s decision to spend £900 million to snatch all the Champions League and European football rights.
Turnover rose 1.8% to £843 million in the half year as TalkTalk notched up a third quarter of revenue growth after several tough years. Harding upgraded forecasts, which sent the shares up 6%. TalkTalk made a pre-tax loss of £9 million against a £46 million profit last year but she insisted it was “a really healthy sign” as she invested in new customers, by factoring in the cost of a free set-top box or router at the start of their contract and reaping the benefit later.
TalkTalk has 4.1 million broadband customers, up 5000 in the quarter.
