Virgin Media lost 51,000 video subscribers in the United Kingdom in the first quarter of 2021, marking its tenth consecutive quarterly television subscriber loss. Sky gained 220,000 customer relationships across Europe, although its overall total fell to 23.45 million, losing 714,000 as a result of changes to how Comcast now accounts for commercial customers in Germany and Italy.
Virgin Media ended the first quarter of 2021 with 3.45 million video subscribers. The company has had a slow leak of video subscribers from a high of 3.90 million in September 2018.
Virgin Media gained 38,500 internet subscribers, with a total of 5.46 million in the United Kingdom.
In Ireland, Virgin Media gained 9,200 video subscribers, for a total of 318,700, having made modest gains over the previous six quarters.
Elsewhere in Europe, parent company Liberty Global gained a total of 16,900 enhanced video subscribers for UPC, the majority of them in Switzerland.
Sky, now a Comcast company, gained 222,000 customer relationships across Europe, ending the first quarter of 2021 with 23.45 million. Comcast does not break out the number of residential television subscribers.
Comcast adjusted its measurement methodology and restated customer numbers for 2019 and 2020, reflecting changes to accounting for commercial customers in Germany and Italy.
Comcast now counts commercial customers based on the number of locations receiving service, consistent with its practice in the United Kingdom. That resulted in an apparent reduction in of 714,000 customer relationships as of the end of 2020.
On the restated basis, Sky gained 465,000 customer relationships in the last six months, having lost 235,000 in the preceding six months.
Parent company Comcast lost 403,000 residential cable television customers in the United States in the first quarter of 2021. It was its sixteenth consecutive quarterly television customer loss, reducing its total to 18.59 million, down from 21.52 million four years previously.