The global shipments of pay-TV set-top boxes increased slightly to 253.1 million in 2015, up from 248.6 million in 2014, thanks to growth of pay-TV services in China and India, according to SNL Kagan.
The research company said that growth in those two regions increased total pay-TV subscribers worldwide to 959 million.
Shipments of cable set-tops remained flat at around 75 million, SNL Kagan said, with much of the global cable market "approaching saturation."
The global market for IP-based set-tops also remained relatively flat, with demand in Europe and Asia offsetting declines in North America.
Shipments of satellite-based STBs continue to account for the largest market segment, consuming 47 percent of the global set-top market in 2015.
Shipments of DVR-enabled set-tops, meanwhile, are declining, with operators choosing to reduce DVR deployment to cut costs, or replace DVR set-tops with virtualized, cloud-based DVR services.
HD-capable set-tops accounted for 76 percent of all global STB shipments in 2015.
Finally, SNL Kagan predicted that by 2019, pay-TV set-top revenue will come in at around $14.55 billion, down from $17.5 billion in 2015.
Manufacturers of pay-TV set-tops have recently undergone a wave of consolidation, with Arris closing its $2.1 billion purchase of Pace earlier this month, and Technicolor closing its purchase of Cisco's CPE business late last year. For its part, Arris sees an increasing portion of its future revenue being derived from virtualized, cloud-based products and services.
For more:
- read this SNL Kagan press release
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