The European arm of US streaming giant Peacock TV saw its revenue plummet by more than £100m in the year before it was axed from Sky, according to newly-filed documents.
The company, which up until January 2024 had provided streaming services in the UK, Germany and Italy via Sky, saw its turnover fall to £28.4m in 2023, down from £163m in the year before.
Peacock said its revenue fell due to it winding down streaming services across Europe.
As a result of its ailing sales, NBC Universal’s streaming platform, which made its UK debut in late 2021, ceased operations at the start of 2024.
Despite this the company actually managed to increase its pre-tax profit to £501,000 during the 12 months, up from £480,000 in 2022.
In a statement published to Companies House, Peacock said: “The company operates in an intensely competitive, consumer-driven and rapidly changing environment and competes with a growing number of companies that provide a broad range of communications products and services and entertainment, news and information products and services to consumers.
“Technological changes are further intensifying and complicating the competitive landscape for the company by challenging existing business models and affecting consumer behaviour.”
Peacock’s US success
Despite a rough run in Europe, Peacock TV’s US arm remains popular, with its revenue for the last three months of 2023 hitting $1bn (£772m) for the first time – a 57 per cent increase from the same period in the year before.
The streamer ended the year with 31 million paying subscribers, having added more than three million in its final quarter.
Peacock’s loss for the three months amounted to $825m (£636.6m), compared with $978m (£754.9m) in the 12 months before.
Group president Mike Cavanagh said: “Our investment in the network and our technology platforms built over decades enabled us to shine, delivering a seamless experience on the internet and Peacock, demonstrating that our company is in an excellent position to win in this era of high bandwidth.”
How have other streaming platforms fared?
In May it was revealed that Disney’s streaming service had turned its first profit since launching in 2019 on the back of popular shows from its Hulu network such as The Bear.
The entertainment giant said its direct-to-consumer streaming service made $47m profit (£37.44m) in the second quarter to 30 March.
The news came after Disney’s streaming service lost around $11bn (£8.4bn) since launching in 2019, including $587m (£467.58m) a year earlier, in the same period.
Disney has managed to turn heavy losses into a profit for the first time by cost-cutting and raising its prices.
According to Martin Lewis’s MoneySavingExpert site, prices went up by £36 a year in the UK, joining other subscription services like Netflix.
Despite this in January Netflix reported 13.1m new subscribers for its fourth quarter, beating the consensus estimate of 8.9m, and up from 7.7m from the same period in 2022.
This helped it to bump full-year revenue up by 12 per cent year-on-year to $33.7bn (£26.5bn) while operating income amounted to $1.5bn (£1.2bn) in the final quarter, also exceeding forecasts.