{"id":880952,"date":"2026-10-22T11:49:12","date_gmt":"2026-10-22T09:49:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/?p=880952"},"modified":"2026-10-22T11:49:15","modified_gmt":"2026-10-22T09:49:15","slug":"another-blow-for-dstv-in-south-africa","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/business\/880952\/another-blow-for-dstv-in-south-africa\/","title":{"rendered":"Another blow for DStv in South Africa"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Canal+ revenue has risen by over 37% since its acquisition of MultiChoice, but the South African company is still struggling to turn itself around.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

While MultiChoice has initiated a plan to reverse its financial woes, aided by its new owner and a massive restructuring, its revenue has continued to decline.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In a trading update for the nine months ended 30 September 2026, Canal+ reported group revenue had increased by 37.5%, largely due to purchasing MultiChoice.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

However, on a like-for-like basis, the picture is different.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The French media giant acquired MultiChoice in September 2025 for approximately R55 billion, with plans to expand its presence in Africa.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The deal also led to Canal+ having a secondary listing on the Johannesburg Stock Exchange (JSE), while its main listing remains in London.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The JSE listing on 3 June 2026 also made Canal+ the first French company to list on the South African bourse.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Since acquiring MultiChoice, the company said it has made progress on its turnaround plan for its new subsidiary.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Canal+ CEO Maxime Saada said, “We are making good progress with the MultiChoice turnaround plan.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“In September, a new, simplified value proposition was launched in South Africa, providing subscribers with more content, greater choice, and better value for the same price.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

While the French company has seen its scale grow since acquiring MultiChoice, its like-for-like revenue, including MultiChoice, declined by 0.3%.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

“Group revenue remained broadly flat (-0.3%) year on year on a like-for-like basis, including nine months\u2019 contribution from MultiChoice,” Canal+ said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

While MultiChoice has increased its year-on-year revenue, aided by currency exchanges, its revenue decreased on a like-for-like basis.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“MultiChoice Group revenue increased 0.4% on a restated basis, notably benefiting from a material positive currency effect,” Canal+ said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“On a like-for-like basis, revenue decreased 3.0%, driven by lower subscription revenue in South Africa,<\/strong> partially offset by higher revenue in most other English-speaking countries.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

MultiChoice and its main platform, DStv, have struggled for years with declining subscription numbers since the advent of streaming services.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Since 2021, the television platform has seen its total subscriber base slowly fall, which it has previously attributed to third-party streaming services.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In its 2025 financial year, the number of DStv subscribers fell by 589,000<\/a>, representing an 8% overall decline.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Since acquiring the company, Canal+ has worked to turn the platform around and has recently launched a new subscription model<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Canal+ previously said that it planned to update DStv’s subscription offerings, which it considered confusing and unwieldy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\n\n\n

DStv subscribers between 2018 and 2025<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
\"\"<\/a><\/figure>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Since acquiring MultiChoice, Canal+ has seen a boost, but the South African company is still struggling to grow revenue at home.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":131,"featured_media":846978,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":true,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_sma_x_autopost_status":"posted","_sma_x_autopost_error":"","_sma_x_post_id":"2113206239618363425","_sma_facebook_post_id":"191437357620492_2245318166288582","_sma_instagram_post_id":"18131479933700805","_sma_x_attempts":1,"footnotes":""},"categories":[9872],"tags":[6633,78,1253],"class_list":["post-880952","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-business","tag-canal","tag-dstv","tag-multichoice"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/880952","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\/131"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=880952"}],"version-history":[{"count":16,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/880952\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":880982,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/880952\/revisions\/880982"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/846978"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=880952"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=880952"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=880952"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}