Broadband Adds Subscribers As HDTV Owners Increase

• by Jack Loechner , Staff Writer @mp_research, January 6, 2009

According to the  Leichtman Research Group, the twenty largest cable and telephone providers in the US,  representing about 94% of the market, acquired approximately 1.3 million net additional high-speed Internet subscribers in the third quarter of 2008. These top broadband providers now account for nearly 66.7 million subscribers. Cable companies have 36.5 million broadband subscribers, and telephone companies have about 30.2 million subscribers.

Other broadband findings for the quarter include:

• The top cable companies added over 870,000 subscribers, representing 67% of the net broadband additions for the quarter versus the top telephone companies
• Overall, broadband additions in 3Q 2008 amounted to 61% of those in 3Q 2007, with cable having 82% as many additions as a year ago, and Telcos 40%
• The top cable broadband providers have a 55% share of the overall market, with a 6.3 million subscriber advantage over the top telephone companies

Bruce Leichtman, president and principal analyst for LRG, Inc., said "Over the past two quarters the top cable providers accounted for 71% of the net broadband additions... cable's recent success... is more a function of the telcos' shift in focus towards higher value subscribers while cable has been... marketing broadband as part of its nearly ubiquitously available Triple Play bundles."

Cable & Telephone Internet Providers
Broadband Internet Provider	Subscribers at End of 3Q 2008	Net Adds in 3Q 2008
Cable Companies
Comcast	14,738,000	381,000
Time Warner	8,634,000	222,000
Cox	3,945,000	60,000
Charter	2,858,200	70,900
Cablevision	2,427,000	32,000
Mediacom	726,000	24,000
Insight	445,100	20,500
Cable ONE	368,614	7,345
RCN	301,000	6,000
Other Major Private Cable Companies	2,050,000	50,000
Total Top Cable	36,492,914	873,745
Telephone Companies
AT&T	14,841,000	148,000
Verizon	8,459,000	129,000
Qwest	2,793,000	61,000
Embarq	1,388,000	24,000
Windstream	962,700	28,400
CenturyTel	628,000	21,000
Frontier	571,946	12,646
FairPoint	294,134	(278)
Cincinnati Bell	231,100	2,100
Total Top Telephone Companies	30,168,880	425,868
Total Broadband	66,661,794	1,299,613
Sources: The Companies and Leichtman Research Group, Inc.

And, selections from a separate LRG study HDTV 2008:  Consumer Awareness, Interest and Ownership, show that 34% of U.S. households have at least one HDTV set, about double the percentage of households that had such TVs two years ago. Overall, 22% of all households purchased a new TV set in the past 12 months, with 43% of this group spending over $1,000 on a new TV.

LRG estimates that about 58% of all HD households are now watching HD programming from a multi-channel video provider, up from 53% last year.  However, about 18% of individuals with an HDTV continue to think that they are watching HD programming, but are not.

Other findings include:

• 38% of HD owners say that replacing an old/broken set or wanting to buy a new TV set was the most important reason for getting their HDTV, compared to 22% citing picture quality, and 7% the quality of HD programming or the number of HD channels
• 44% with annual household incomes over $50,000 have an HDTV compared to 20% with annual household incomes under $50,000
• 33% of HDTV owners have more than one HDTV set, and 25% are likely to get another HDTV set in the next year
• 9% of HD owners say that they switched multi-channel video providers when they purchased their HDTV
• 42% of HDTV owners say that they were told how to receive HD programming when they purchased their set

For more information about the LRG Broadband study, please visit here, or about HDTV, visit here.