Viasat Nordic DTH down 15,000 in 1Q10

Modern Times Group MTG AB (publ.) (“MTG” or “the Group”) (Nasdaq OMX Stockholm Large Cap Market: MTGA, MTGB) today announced its financial results for the first quarter and three months ended 31 March 2010.

Viasat Broadcasting

Pay-TV Nordic

Viasat Broadcasting’s pay-TV operations in the Nordic region market and sell Viasat’s premium pay-TV packages on the Viasat DTH satellite platform and third party IPTV platforms. Viasat also distributes its 24 Viasat-branded pay-TV channels via a wide range of other third party pay-TV networks. The Nordic pay-TV business reported 2% year on year sales growth in the first quarter and 6% growth at constant exchange rates.

(000's)                           Mar 2010  Dec 2009  Mar 2009
                                  --------  --------  --------
Premium subscribers                    826       823       760
- of which, DTH satellite              670       685       666
- of which, IPTV                       156       138        94
Basic DTH satellite subscribers         44        45        62

Viasat added 18,000 net new premium IPTV subscribers in the first quarter alone and the decline in the DTH satellite base reflected the seasonally lower sales period and the completion of the analogue TV shutdowns in the fourth quarter. The number of subscribers with ViasatPlus recordable digital set-top boxes increased year on year to 144,000 (122,000) and from 141,000 at the end of 2009. The number of multi-room subscriptions also increased year on year to 216,000 (177,000) and from 211,000 at the end of 2009. The number of HDTV subscribers more than doubled year on year to 124,000 (53,000) and increased from 106,000 at the end of the year.

Viasat is the leading provider of online TV content in Sweden, and launched a subscription video-on-demand service on its Viasat OnDemand internet portal in Sweden, Norway and Denmark in February 2010. The subscription service makes an unrivalled range of TV content available over the internet, including major live sports events, hit TV series and over 200 feature films at any given time.

Pay-TV Emerging Markets

Viasat’s Emerging Market pay-TV operations market and sell premium pay-TV packages on the Viasat DTH satellite platforms in the Baltics and Ukraine, and on Elion’s IPTV platform in Estonia. The business also has shared management control of the Raduga TV Russian DTH satellite platform, and distributes its 11 Viasat-branded channels via third party pay-TV networks to subscribers in 25 countries across Central and Eastern Europe and in the United States.

(000's)                           Mar 2010  Dec 2009  Mar 2009
                                  --------  --------  --------
Premium DTH subscribers                224       216       214
Basic DTH subscribers*                 109        24        15
IPTV subscribers                         9         -         -
Mini-pay TV subscriptions           44,335    40,778    37,740

Viasat’s Baltic and Ukrainian DTH satellite pay-TV platforms added 8,000 net new premium subscribers in the first quarter following successful subscriber acquisition campaigns, whilst the Raduga TV DTH satellite platform in Russia had 83,000 subscribers at the end of the period. Viasat also had 9,000 IPTV subscribers on the Elion platform in Estonia at the end of the first quarter. The wholesale mini-pay business added 3.5 million subscriptions quarter on quarter, and 6.6 million subscriptions year on year.

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