Russian pay-TV penetration to exceed 50 percent

A Russian analyst group has said that pay-TV penetration in Russia will exceed 50 percent in 2012, BroadbandTVNews reports.

It expects the market to generate a revenue of RUB40 billion (US$ 1.3 billion), up 20 percent year-on-year.

The overall Russian pay-TV base is expected to exceed 26 million users.

The group iKS-Consulting named Tricolor as the leading pay TV company, with 7.6 million customers, followed by Rostelecom with 5.45 million and MTS with 2.78 million, DigitalTvEurope reported yesterday.

ER-Telecom connected over half-a-million new cable customers last year.

According to the company, the number of subscribers increased by 40 percent during the course of the year, taking its total to 1.73 million, which was six times higher than the average growth rate for the country’s cable TV sector.

iKS predicted that pay TV would reach 35 million subscribers by 2015.