This week Comcast’s CEO Brian Roberts spoke at the fireside cat during the SCB MoffettNathanson’s TMT conference. During that talk, he went over how Comcast thinks it is well-positioned to take on cord cutting. Not only does he think Comcast can take on cord cutting but make more money from cord cutters in the long run.
“We make more money, and that’s part of the revenue shift of the company. If people are cordcutting, yes, we lose revenue, but we lose expense and therefore it’s maybe not such a big deal as long as they take broadband on the other side,” Roberts said according to Cablefax. “We can envision a day where broadband is even more valuable to them and to us and to the shareholders.”
In Comcast’s Q1 earnings report released this morning, the company reported it lost 614,000 video customers losses. That works out to be 6,800 subscribers Every Day. The company added just 32,324 broadband customers for the quarter.
While customer numbers were down, revenue was also down 4.3% to over $29 million in the 1st quarter of 2023. This is down from just over $31 million in the 1st quarter of 2022.
Peacock one of Comcast’s plan to offset cord cutting reported that it lost $704 million in the first three months of 2023. This works out to be about $7,822 million lost every day in the 1st quarter of 2023.
“A Peacock subscriber is not as valuable today, but it’s a lot closer than it was a few years ago when you combine the fee as compared to being a free service and now being $5/month,” Roberts said. “And then the advertising hopefully can double that and get you to the kind of money we’ve been getting from distributors over time and you can see a path to transitioning from this point over to the other side of the river.”
Comcast is not alone in struggling to get to the other side of the river. Reportedly Paramount+ and Disney+ are both still losing money but hope to be profitable in 2024 or 2025. No word yet on when Comcast expects Peacock to become profitable.
Comcast, in 2023 faces new headwinds that it hasn’t had in years past. New internet options like 5G Home internet from T-Mobile, AT&T, and Verizon bring cord cutting from just being about TV services to internet services. Traditional cord cutting is speeding up with no signs of slowing down.
For now though, Comcast’s CEO seems confident he has a plan to address these headwinds and make the company even more profitable.