Luxembourg-based satellite operator SES says that its global reach, as at the end of 2013, is now 291 million TV homes. Expressed as individuals then SES suggests the total number viewing one of more of its client’s channels is close to 800 million.

Europe alone reaches 151 million TV homes, and SES claims market leadership by some considerable margin over its arch-rival, Paris-based Eutelsat.

Its European satellite viewership is up 7 percent year-on-year to 106 million homes (from 99m), while its indirect reach (via cable has also grown (by 1%)( to 153 million connected homes. IPTV-based viewership has shown the largest growth, albeit from a lower base, of 27 percent from 25 million to 31 million homes.

There has been y-o-y growth for each of the SES regions. Its North American reach is up by 3 percent to 75 million homes, Africa/India/MENA region is up an impressive 18 percent to 31 million, while Latam has seen growth of 5 percent from 21 million to 23 million homes.  AsiaPac region has expanded 7 percent from 11 million to 12 million homes.

SES says 35 percent of TV homes are receiving signals by direct satellite (up from 34%), and this places satellite at the top of the distribution tree, ahead of terrestrial (29%), Cable (27%) and IPTV (9%). When digital reception is measured, SES says there are 210 million digital TV homes in Europe, and satellite leads the market with 41 percent, ahead of digital terrestrial (30%) and cable (19%) while IPTV delivery has a 10 percent market share.

Of those numbers, some 86 million homes are watching HDTV services, again with satellite leading in terms of market share (38.3%) ahead of cable (21%), digital terrestrial (15%) and IPTV (12%).

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