Research and Markets: 2008 Australia Broadcasting And Pay TV Annual Publication Profiles...

Research and Markets: 2008 Australia Broadcasting And Pay TV Annual Publication Profiles Key Market Sectors In Australia's Free-To-Air TV, Digital TV, Pay TV And Radio Markets

DUBLIN, Ireland--(Business Wire)--
Research and Markets
(http://www.researchandmarkets.com/reports/c86974) has announced the
addition of "2008 Australia -- Broadcasting and Pay TV" to their
offering.

2008 Australia Broadcasting and Pay TV Annual Publication profiles
key market sectors in Australia's free-to-air TV, digital TV, pay TV
and radio markets. It provides revenue and subscriber statistics as
well comprehensive market overviews in areas such as personal video
recorders, digital radio, Interactive TV, set-top boxes, podcasting
and datacasting.

The report reveals that although the dominance of FTA television
as a mass communication medium has been unsurpassed for many decades,
the industry is now facing challenges from a number of fronts as
incumbent broadcasters cling to their lucrative oligopolies. Digital
FTA TV has been held up in a vicious cycle since it was launched in
2001. Available digital content, beyond simply offering better picture
qualities, has been nowhere near sufficient to help drive digital TV.

The recent changes to media ownership and broadcasting regulations
in Australia are likely to lead to further consolidation of radio
operators and increased cross-media ownership. The proposed shake up
of the market by Lachlan Murdoch could start off a range of new
developments. Competition from within and outside the industry, which
is already strong, is predicted to increase.

After decades of delays, digital radio will finally be introduced
in Australia from January 2009. It however seems that the radio
innovations for the foreseeable future will come from the Internet and
other new media developments rather than from the radio broadcasting
industry.

Key highlights:

Free-to-air TV

-- Marketing and media buyers are increasingly turning to
alternative media, such as through Internet and mobile
channels in order to reach consumers. The Internet will become
increasingly entertainment-based as broadband penetration is
predicted to continue to rise steadily over next few years.

-- Consumers will be demanding a richer and extensive online
experience through services such as video-based entertainment.

-- The FTA networks are expected to see intense competition for
viewers and advertising in 2008 and beyond, which will impact
on their cost margins as they will be forced to put more money
into programming and marketing. For more information, see
chapter 2.1, page 9.

-- TV stations will be forced to market themselves more
aggressively due to threats from the new media sector.
Broadcasting's ad revenues are already gradually being
squeezed due to falling audiences and rising costs.

Digital TV

-- By 2008, the move towards flat panel TVs had further
accelerated with CRT TVs only constituting a very small
proportion of TV sales as the price of the smaller screen LCD
TVs and standard definition plasmas had dropped further. This
trend will continue to accelerate through to 2009 as CRT
televisions should by that time be totally phased out by
retailers. For more information, see chapter 3.1, page 31.

-- Household penetration of digital TVs (including set-top boxes,
PVRs and integrated digital TV sets), is predicted to rise
from 28% in 2007 to 37% in 2008 and 51% by 2008.

-- Pay TV DVRs currently dominate the DVR market, with
proprietary FTA based recorders (mainly TiVo recorders) taking
only a small slice of the market. Of the pay TV market, the
Foxtel iQ recorder holds the vast majority.

-- We predict that the launch of Seven's TiVo recorder will lift
the numbers of current FTA PVRs, but not to level significant
enough to break out of its niche product status, or to be of
any sort of threat to the pay TV PVR model. For more
information, see chapter 3.8.9.2, page 50.

Pay TV

-- Early indicators show that digitalisation of the service alone
has not made a huge difference to pay TV. People continue to
look for good content, and in principle, the more channels the
better, plus reasonable prices.

-- By 2007 pay TV penetration had only reached 24%, and growth is
expected to continue to increase modestly to around 29% by
2009. However this still falls well short of most other
developed nations.

-- While it is still not impossible for pay TV penetration to
reach the 40% penetration mark, this can only reached if pay
TV companies offer more attractive price packages, or include
competitively priced broadband.

-- An overall pay TV revenue growth of 14% was recorded in 2007
and we expect growth to remain reasonably strong in 2008, with
a slight drop to around 12%. For more information, see chapter
4.6.2, page 92.

-- From 2007 the cost structure of the industry began to become
more sustainable and the industry reaches profitable
territory. This trend is continuing into 2008.

Radio

-- Although its advertising base is growing, the radio market is
losing share to other media sectors such as TV. The declining
power of FM radio is expected to be a key trend during 2008
and beyond.

-- The launch of digital radio, which will start in capital
cities from January 2009, is expected to cost the radio sector
about $400 million. For more information, see chapter 5.2.2.2,
page 115.

-- Rather than looking at it as essential infrastructure
technology, which would allow radio broadcasters to run their
networks more efficiently and effectively, the industry has
concentrated on finding exclusive services that they could
offer over this network.

For more information, visit
http://www.researchandmarkets.com/reports/c86974.

Research and Markets
Laura Wood, Senior Manager, press@researchandmarkets.com
Fax: +353-1-4100-980

Copyright Business Wire 2008