Another good year for BSkyB: the broadcaster saw its profits triple to £878m in the 12 months to June, up from £259m last year. CEO Jeremy Darroch says this is partly due to to sports fans signing up to high-definition to watch the World Cup (even though Sky didn't actually have the football), while ad revenue also held up pretty well. Good news - particularly since it's currently negotiating with Rupert Murdoch over the 61% of shares he doesn’t already own...
 
HD TV has been a big success for Sky: not only did it see its customer base more than double over the year, but between April and June it added another 429,000 HD customers, most of whom signed up just in time to watch England’s turgid performances at the World Cup. In total, BSkyB’s revenue jumped by more than 10%, to £5.9bn. Just goes to show that even in a recession, sports fans will be willing to fork out - even if it is to see what their heroes’ pores look like when they're embarrassing an entire nation...
 
Now it’s signed up a substantial chunk of the country's football fans, though, Darroch has admitted that it’s likely there will be ‘a pause for breath’ as the number of new subscriptions level off. But he may have changed tack just in time: today, BSkyB announced a £150m deal with HBO, the US channel responsible for the likes of Sex and the City, The Wire and True Blood. Under the terms of the deal, BSkyB will own the exclusive rights to HBO’s entire back catalogue. Nice.
 
The bumper results will certainly give the company some ammunition when it comes to negotiations with Murdoch: earlier this month, BSkyB’s board (which is chaired by Murdoch’s in-no-way-conflicted son James) demanded he increase his offer from the current 700p per share (valuing the company at around £12bn) to at least 800p.
 
As for new pay-TV rival BT, things are looking a touch less rosy: it's just posted what it calls ‘acceptable’ quarterly results, with revenue down slightly from £5.2bn to £5bn, but profits up from £272m to £375m thanks to some tough cost-cutting. Time will tell whether its plan to win over sports fans by offering a cheap Sky Sports package (so cheap, in fact, that it could actually make a loss on each new subscription) will boost results next time round...

Still, BT will have its work cut out to catch up with the ever-improving Sky. The broadcaster’s latest offering is 3D TV, which it’s planning to roll out in October. Although we’re not sure it’s going to catch on quite as quickly as HD, considering you’ll still need a pair of distinctly silly-looking glasses to watch it…

In today's bulletin:
Business nervous as Government targets forced retirement
Shell profits while BP toils
BSkyB profits jump - and BT back in the black
Editor's blog: driven round the bend
Why aren't we wooing Indian entrepeneurs like the US?

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