China will become largest pay-TV market in Asia

China is set to become the largest pay-TV market in Asia in terms of revenues this year, surpassing Japan for the first time and generating US$7.5billion, according to a report by SNL Kagan, IPTVnews reported.

China's pay-TV market generated revenues of US$5.6 billion in 2010, up 31.1 percent from the previous year, with growth driven by cable digitalisation and a nine percent increase in pay-TV households.

Between 2010 and 2015, China's multichannel subscriber base is forecast to rise at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 5.8 percent to reach 259.5 million households, while video service revenues will grow at a CAGR of 20.5 percent to reach US$ 14.7 billion.

Although IPTV is gaining momentum, cable continued to dominate the country's pay-TV landscape last year, accounting for 95.7 percent of multichannel subscribers and 91.2 percent of video service revenues in 2010. IPTV accounted for 3.8 percent of China's multichannel subscribers in 2010, with 7.4 million households generating US$493.2 million in video service revenues.

Forty-seven percent of China's cable TV subscribers had already migrated to digital connections by the end of 2010. An additional 22.5 million households are expected to adopt digital cable TV services in 2011.

High-definition TV services are believed to be gaining ground, with 2.5 million cable homes adopting the set-top boxes and packages needed to access HD programming in 2010. By 2015, 17.2 million cable households are forecast to be receiving HD programming.