The number of pay-TV subscribers in Eastern Europe is predicted to rise by 17 million subscribers over the next five years according to new research from Digital TV Research.
It predicts the overall number of pay-TV subscribers in Eastern Europe will increase to 78.08 million by 2023.
Russia is expected to account for half of the region’s pay-TV subscribers in 2023 despite Digital TV Research predicting it will lose 1.5 million pay-TV subscribers over the same period.
The research also suggests the number of pay-TV subs will fall in 10 of the 22 countries covered in the report.
Simon Murray, principal analyst at Digital TV Research, said: “Eastern Europe is slowly ridding itself of the legacy of analogue cable TV. Twenty million households still subscribed to analogue cable at end-2017 – more than digital cable. Many of these homes receive very basic packages; often as part of their rent. Some of the remaining analogue cable subs do not want to convert to more expensive digital pay TV platforms and will therefore switch to DTT.”
