Purchase this report

In this Industry Report

One of the 'BRIC' countries and the biggest television market in the world, China has long been seen as a land of opportunity for foreign investors. But many have found the unique market conditions impossible to fathom. China cable TV is Screen Digest's first major China-specific management report. It is also the first report on the market that gives a comprehensive overview of China's cable television market with 10 years of detailed historical data and five year projections for market size and value. Also included are detailed profiles of the 20 largest cable operators.

The report details the general economic situation of the market, looking at population and economic growth, TV penetration and the important political structure of the broadcasting industry in China. The report also provides a comprehensive introduction to the cable television industry in China, detailing structure of the cable TV market, current progress towards digital migration, service offering, the regulatory environment and key issues around triple-play, premium pay TV content and foreign channels.
Produced as a collaboration between Screen Digest and R&TI (a division of China's media regulator SARFT), this report also features a unique interpretation of major broadcasting policies, the competitive situation of all digital TV platforms and strategic plans on issues including triple-play, Video-on-demand and high definition TV.

With detailed data on technology suppliers to the market (down to an operator level for the top 20 companies),, this report provides a comprehensive market review and assessment for investors, operators, content players and technology suppliers.

Key findings:

• China is the world's largest TV market, with 378m TV households and 152m cable TV households by the end of 2007.
• Cable accounts for 99.3 per cent of the Chinese pay TV market, and is expected to maintain market share at over 90 per cent through to 2012.
• Licensed cable operators were recently consolidated from thousands to just over three hundred.
• Penetration of cable homes-passed in China is 79 per cent, with roughly 25 per cent cable operators achieving between 91 per cent and 100 per cent uptake within their area of operation.
• 86.5 per cent of all cable operators transmit 30 or more analogue channels on their networks; 24 per cent of cable operators carry 40 or more analogue channels.
• 65.6 per cent of cable operators offer on demand services, 53.8 per cent of operators can provide cable Internet, only 6.5 per cent of operators offer cable telephony service due to regulatory issues.
• The wide range of analogue channels in the basic service mean pay TV has limited appeal. Cable TV ARPU has been stagnant at around $2 for the past decade.
• Cable Internet contributes an average of two per cent to total cable revenue
• Pay TV contributes less than 10 per cent to total cable TV revenue.
• China aims to switch-off analogue TV by 2015. Current digital cable TV subscribers are 25m (17 per cent of cable TV homes).
• Three HD channels are available on cable in most areas in the country.
• Premium television is alien to the majority of Chinese viewers. Cable operators have largely failed to address this problem
• Government policy is still the driving force behind major changes in China's cable industry, despite occasional local mavericks.

In the report:

Table of contents

Tables and Charts

Television Intelligence

Author/s

Lingjie Wang

Territories covered

Asia-Pacific

China,

Companies mentioned