PETALING JAYA: Astro Malaysia Holdings Bhd posted a 20% quarter-on-quarter (qoq) bounce in web revenue to RM127mil for its fourth quarter of the monetary yr ended Jan 31, 2022 (This autumn’22), after making an allowance for the influence of “Cukai Makmur” (Prosperity) Tax) in FY22.
In a press release, the group identified that promoting expenditure (adex) had elevated 56% qoq to RM146mil, lifted by financial restoration and the resumption of signature productions.
Income was 1% larger qoq to RM1.03bil, and the group has declared a fourth interim dividend of 1.5 sen per share and proposed a remaining dividend of 0.75 sen per share.
This brings the full-year dividend to six.75 sen per share.
“This represents 76% of the FY22 income, over and above our dividend coverage of paying out 75% of web revenue,” mentioned Astro chairman Tun Zaki Azmi.
Zaki identified that Astro’s This autumn’22 outcomes improved qoq on the again of financial restoration.
“Nevertheless, client sentiment and spending energy continued to be gentle.
“The group remained money generative, price disciplined and proactive in its capital administration,” he mentioned.
Astro group CEO Henry Tan mentioned in FY23, Astro is powering up by changing into an Web service supplier, bundling Astro Fiber with content material, introducing Astro Fiber standalone broadband to enhance its suite of choices, in addition to the full-scale rollout of the group’s addressable promoting proposition.
Tan added that anti-piracy efforts by the authorities, content material companions and business gamers noticed vital progress, together with landmark rulings to denounce content material piracy as theft, unlawful and punishable by regulation. “Extra lately, the passing of the Copyright (Modification) Act 2022 is one other main step ahead in addressing piracy, enabling authorized motion to be taken towards sellers of Unlawful Streaming Units (ISD),,” he mentioned.
Tan famous that whereas the nation’s economic system is predicted to get better in FY23 supported by the transition from pandemic to endemic, financial restoration is predicted to be uneven, with headwinds within the type of intermittent Covid-19 waves, inflation, potential rate of interest hikes and extra Not too long ago, potential spillover from world geopolitical occasions.
“The group stays cautiously optimistic and can proceed to observe enterprise situations, while prudently managing prices,” he mentioned.
Tan additionally identified that in FY22, the group had executed its transformation plan and streaming aggregation technique, and provided better-value bundles in a single invoice.
“Clients are responding nicely to those new bundles, and we’re forward of expectations when it comes to present subscribers migrating to the brand new packs and recontracting.
“We now supply three distinct companies for Malaysians – Astro; our premium Pay-TV model, NJOI; our pay as you go choice and sooka; our standalone freemium streaming service catering to Millennials with a mobile-first life-style,” he mentioned.
The group additionally doubled its streaming companies to 6, with Netflix, Disney+ Hotstar and TVBAnywhere+ becoming a member of the present Astro GO, HBO Go and iQIYI.
Netflix has been built-in immediately onto Extremely and Ulti Packing containers and Disney+ Hotstar will quickly observe go well with.
Tan famous that over 550,000 properties are already on Extremely and Ulti Packing containers, which run on each satellite tv for pc and broadband.
In the meantime, Astro GO has 919,000 month-to-month lively customers with common weekly viewing time of 4 hours, whereas On Demand reveals streamed grew 139% year-on-year to 530 minutes.
“In FY22, Astro’s broadband base additionally elevated by 58% yoy as extra prospects bundled broadband with content material for comfort and worth,” mentioned Tan.