Dish Loses 64,000 Net Pay TV Subscribers as Satellite Losses Outweigh Sling TV Gains
Dish Network lost about 64,000 net pay TV subscribers in the third quarter, compared with a gain of 30,000 in the year-ago period and a decline of 294,000 in the second quarter of the year.
The company disclosed in a regulatory filing early Monday that it added around 117,000 Sling TV subscribers in the latest quarter, ending September with 2.12 million Sling TV subs. In the third quarter of 2022, Dish had added 214,000 Sling TV subscribers. “The decrease in net Sling TV subscriber additions was primarily related to lower Sling TV subscriber activations and higher Sling TV subscriber disconnects in 2023,” the company, led by president and CEO W. Erik Carlson and chairman Charlie Ergen, said in a regulatory filing. “We continue to experience increased competition, including competition from other subscription video-on-demand and live-linear OTT service providers, many of which are providers of our content and offer football and other seasonal sports programming direct to subscribers on an à la carte basis.”
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Dish also recorded a net decline of about 181,000 customers in its traditional Dish satellite TV business in the third quarter, ending September with 6.72 million. In the year-ago period, it had lost 184,000 subs. “This decrease in net Dish TV subscriber losses primarily resulted from lower Dish TV subscriber disconnects in 2023, partially offset by lower gross new Dish TV subscriber activations,” the company’s filing explained.
Dish’s total pay TV users as of the end of September 2023 amounted to 8.84 million, compared with nearly 10.02 million as of September 2022 and 10.98 million as of 2021.
Quarterly revenue totaled $3.70 billion, down from $4.10 billion in the corresponding period in 2022. Dish swung to a third-quarter loss of $139 million from a year-ago profit of $412 million.
Dish’s stock dropped more than 8 percent in Monday pre-market trading.
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