{"id":827907,"date":"2025-06-12T10:00:00","date_gmt":"2025-06-12T08:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/?p=827907"},"modified":"2025-06-12T09:33:50","modified_gmt":"2025-06-12T07:33:50","slug":"top-south-african-company-goes-from-hero-to-zero","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/technology\/827907\/top-south-african-company-goes-from-hero-to-zero\/","title":{"rendered":"Top South African company goes from hero to zero"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Multichoice\u2019s latest financial results show declining revenue and subscriber numbers. It faces a very tough time turning the company around.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

On Wednesday, 11 June 2025, Multichoice released its annual financial results for the year ended 31 March 2025.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It described its macroeconomic trading environment as exceptionally challenging. It stated that it faced unprecedented headwinds over the past year.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

These headwinds include an increase in piracy, the shift to online streaming, and competition from content on social media.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Revenue declined by 9% to R50.8 billion, primarily due to an 11% drop in subscription revenue, and trading profit decreased to R4.0 billion.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In South Africa, Multichoice\u2019s 90-day active DStv subscribers declined from 8.551 million to 7.937 million over the last year.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the Rest of Africa, Multichoice\u2019s 90-day active DStv subscribers declined from 12.383 million to 10.655 million over the last year.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This resulted in a decline in 90-day active DStv subscribers across the group from 20.934 million in 2024 to 18.592 million in 2025.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Multichoice\u2019s strategy to address the decline in DStv subscribers is to invest in ShowMax, its online streaming platform. However, this is not working out.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Although Showmax\u2019s active paying customers increased by 44% year-on-year, its revenue declined from R1.3 billion to R1.0 billion.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Showmax\u2019s trading loss increased from R2.6 billion to R4.9 billion. Simply put, the streaming platform is losing money at a rapid rate.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Multichoice previously stated<\/a> that it is confident that Showmax would generate $1 billion (approximately R18 billion) with its Showmax 2.0 service.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In May 2023, Multichoice announced its goal to generate revenue of more than $1 billion within five years, with a trading profit breakeven target by the end of the full year 2027.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It was targeting earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, and amortisation (EBITDA) margins of 25% and free cash flow margins of around 20% at scale.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Two years in, and the company is moving in the wrong direction. Instead of showing rapid revenue growth, it is declining.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Multichoice revenue decline<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Multichoice reported a significant reduction in its revenue from continuing operations from R55 billion to R49.98 billion, a  9.1% decrease.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This has continued Multichoice\u2019s downward revenue spiral since 2023, when the group reported revenue of R59.1 billion.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The overwhelming majority of the deterioration in its revenue came from its primary source of revenue, its subscription fees.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Multichoice\u2019s subscription fees fell off a cliff from R45.2 billion to R40.2 billion, a troubling 11.1% deterioration.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It stated that the reason for the deterioration in its subscription revenue was due to foreign currency as well as subscriber number headwinds.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Multichoice subscriber numbers decline<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Multichoice have been experiencing a significant reduction in its subscriber numbers in recent years. The current result added to the downward trend in its primary revenue source.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Multichoice saw a significant reduction in its subscribers in South Africa as well as in the Rest of Africa, bringing its overall active subscribers down by 7.5%.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This means that Multichoice lost 1.18 million active customers over the last year, with no signs that this trend can be reversed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
\"\"<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Multichoice struggling financially<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Multichoice reported a 49% decrease in its trading profit which was primarily due to major setbacks in Showmax and the rest of Africa.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Multichoice saw its trading profit from its Rest of Africa business fall from a profit of R1.3 billion to a loss of R760 million.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The reason why Multichoice did not report a net loss was due to a successful sale of its insurance business, NMSIS, at a 60% profit to its book value of R3.4 billion.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This helped the group report a net profit of R1.8 billion as well as rid itself from technical insolvency.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

However, looking at Multichoice\u2019s core operations and excluding the once-off impact of the NMSI sale, Multichoice would have reported a net loss of R1.6 billion keeping all else equal.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

R million<\/strong><\/td>2024<\/strong><\/td>2025<\/strong><\/td>% Change<\/strong><\/td><\/tr>
Revenue<\/td>R54,999<\/td>R49,980<\/td>-9%<\/mark><\/strong><\/td><\/tr>
Trading Profit<\/td>R7,877<\/td>R4,038<\/td>-49%<\/mark><\/strong><\/td><\/tr>
Operating Profit<\/td>R7,080<\/td>R4,664<\/td>-34%<\/mark><\/strong><\/td><\/tr>
Net Profit<\/td>-R4,148<\/td>R1,780<\/td>+143%<\/mark><\/strong><\/td><\/tr>
Equity<\/td>-R1,068<\/td>R1,602<\/td>+250%<\/mark><\/strong><\/td><\/tr>
Overall Active Subscribers (000′)<\/td>15,685<\/td>14,505<\/td>-8%<\/mark><\/strong><\/td><\/tr><\/tbody><\/table><\/div><\/figure>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Multichoice\u2019s latest financial results show declining revenue and subscriber numbers. It faces a very tough time turning the company around.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":747504,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9878],"tags":[78,1253,10293],"class_list":["post-827907","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-technology","tag-dstv","tag-multichoice","tag-showmax"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/827907","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=827907"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/827907\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":827934,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/827907\/revisions\/827934"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/747504"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=827907"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=827907"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=827907"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}