Verizon reported losses of 18,000 Fios TV customers in the third quarter, marking the third straight quarter in which it has lost pay TV subscribers.
The IPTV operator has now lost 36,000 Fios TV customers in the first nine months of 2017. In the comparable third-quarter period of 2016, it gained 36,000 subscribers. Fios currently has 4.6 million remaining pay TV customers.
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Verizon CFO Matt Ellis said the losses are related to an “ongoing shift” from linear to over-the-top vMVPD services. Earlier this month, rival AT&T revealed that it lost 390,000 customers across its DirecTV and U-verse linear platforms, but its OTT-based DirecTV Now service gained 300,000 subscribers during the period.
Comcast, meanwhile, foretold Q3 losses of up to 150,000 pay TV users.
With disruptions related to hurricane disasters adding to the complexity of cord cutting, some analysts are predicting that overall linear losses in the pay TV industry will surpass 1 million in the third quarter.
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Happily for Verizon, Fios gained 66,000 internet users in the third quarter and now has a total of 5.8 million. This performance surpassed analyst consensus forecast.
“When you move to over-the-top for your video entertainment, the quality of that broadband connection becomes more important than ever,” Ellis said. “And a fiber connection is the best connection for that.”
Overall, Verizon surpassed analyst predictions for both net income and revenue in the third quarter. For a more holistic look at the telco’s Q3 business, read this FierceWireless article.