Payment television in Portugal grows without stopping

While in Spain the payment television seems to stagnate in the barrier of the two million, Portugal, with a population four times less than the Spanish, already exceeds 2.4 million subscribers.

With a growth rate of more than 70,000 ups monthly, Portugal is about to reach two and a half million subscribers to payment television in very little space. So far in 2009, Portuguese platforms have managed to add 232,000 new customers.

This growth is causing that for large groups of content, Portugal looks with better eyes than Spain studying new product and channel releases. In addition, the piracy that at first had done a lot of damage to takeoff, is now at bay and platforms such as Zon TV have invested great sums in improving their conditional access (in the case of Zon, encrypted with Nagra 3).

The Portuguese offer is practically concentrated in the hands of Zon TV Cabo that concentrates seven out of ten subscribers (66%). Of these subscribers, about 400,000 access Zon TV through the Hispasar satellite, while the rest does it by cable.

The thrust of Portugal Telecom, which barely disputes 20% of the business share, is forcing the six platforms operating in the neighboring country to sharpen the ingenuity. For example, Zon TV recently launched a special remote control with buttons with direct access to children's channels.