LATAM pay-TV set to grow to 95MN subs by 2021
Details
Juan Fernandez Gonzalez
| 01 March 2018

After years of moderate increases, Latin America's pay-TV is set to increase its growth rate over the next three years, according to Business Bureau.

Following the Forecast TV report, the regional pay-TV market will add over five million subs through to 2021, reaching 94.74 million pay-TV households by the end of that year.

With 89.45 million pay-TV subscriptions by December 2017, growth has been steady but gradually slowing down over the last three years, since it reached 85.37 million subs in 2014.

"2017 has been a year of growth for the Latin American region. A disparity can be noticed from operation to operation or across different regions, but still growth has been delivered," said Tomás Gennari, EVP, Business Bureau. "For 2018, we forecast a flatter evolution, but pay-TV will continue to be a growth driver for the region."

By the end of last year, Brazil was the largest market if taking into account pirate and under-reported connections. After Brazil's nearly 25 million subs, it followed Mexico with 21.6 million (it's the largest market if only considering legal access) and Argentina (11 million).

Argentina (78%), Venezuela (76%), the Caribbean (73%), Uruguay (68%) and Mexico (67%) showed the highest service penetration.
Regarding revenues, the analysis firm estimates that pay-TV operators invoices $18.5 billion in 2017, but that nearly one in four subscriptions are not properly reported.

According to Business Bureau, the industry is missing out on $5.4 billion per year due to piracy and under-reported operations.