Price increase painful, but necessary — MultiChoice MD

John Ugbe, Managing Director, MultiChoice Nigeria, explains the organisation’s
new subscription rates
The hike in MultiChoice’s subscription rates has hit subscribers like lightning.
The prevalent view is that MultiChoice has no justification for such and is just
taking advantage of the lack of alternatives in the sector. How accurate is this
view?
Price increases are always painful and we are very mindful of this. However,
they are sometimes necessary for businesses to provide service to their
consumers and also provide necessary returns to stakeholders. They ensure
that we can continue to provide quality entertainment to our subscribers even
with the rising costs and inflation. It is because of the prevailing economic
situation and rising cost of content and our other inputs that we have had to
increase the cost of subscriptions and this has affected all the other entities
across the continent. If you look at a lot of goods and services you will see
that there an increase in a lot of sectors as we are not isolated.
Many subscribers are calling on MultiChoice to institute a pay-as-you-watch
regime, which some claim is available to MultiChoice subscribers in South Africa
and some other countries. Are you looking in that direction?
As a leader in innovation, we consider all viable options to provide our
subscribers with the best and most affordable way to consume entertainment.
At the moment, we provide our services through a model that is in use around
the world that allows us to take advantage of the economies of scale and
provide an aggregate service that reduces the costs for all subscribers.
I can confirm that no other country under MultiChoice is providing its pay-TV
services through a “pay as you watch” model. People often confuse “Pay as
you watch” model with “Pay Per view”, where essentially, subscribers pay
specifically for big ticket events in addition to their monthly subscriptions. This
effectively even makes the subscriptions more expensive.
We have opted for a more economic model where our subscribers have access
to these big tickets events as part of their monthly subscriptions. We will
always strive to bring the best entertainment in the most affordable way and
also continue with our innovation. An example is our Catch up service which is
our Video on demand service, that allows you to watch your best programs at
your convenience and our Box office service which lets you download the latest
blockbuster releases with your PVR decoder and online from your couch at
home.
There are claims that the hike in subscription rates has been effected only in
Nigeria. Is this the correct position?
This is not true, as subscription rates have been increased across the
continent. However, as an independent entity, we ensure that we take the
decisions based on the prevailing market conditions. For example, where other
countries may have effected price increases last year, this is our first increase
in two years notwithstanding the changes in inflation foreign exchange and
other indices in our local market.
Price increases, when not steep, cause little or no irritation. Couldn’t your new
price regime, starting from 1 April, has been less steep?
If you look at the changes in the economic indices, you will see that we have
gone to great lengths to absorb some of the impacts. If you also look at the
content we offer in comparison to our competitors, you will see that we still
provide a lot of value for the price of our product. We recently at no cost to the
subscriber upgraded a lot of our subscribers who had the old DStv decoders
with old technology to the newest HD decoders, and in many cases even
upgraded subscribers to the cutting edge new Explora decoder, which is in high
demand.
We also continue to increase our content line-up and in the 2014 alone, we
added at least seven more channels to our bouquets. We also now bring you
the best series on ‘Express from the US’ which means that you get to watch
them on the Explora decoder just six hours after it is premiered in the US
market. Our local content is not left behind, as we have continued to premiere
some of the best local series and movies on our AfricaMagic channels. We also
ensure that our subscribers have a choice as they can choose from our large
array of bouquets which are available at varying price points, which allows
them to tailor their entertainment line up to their lifestyle. Thus you can enjoy
the best entertainment there is out there from just N1,200 per month.
Most MultiChoice subscribers in Nigeria believe the country is where the highest
subscription rates are charged. Why is this so?
No, we do not have the highest subscription rates as many people believe and
this is a fact. Subscription rates vary in Africa and the rest of the world
according to several factors including the local costs of doing business. I am
sure that you can independently verify that Multichoice Nigeria does not have
the highest subscriptions in the world or the rest of Africa

bull shit

None of us using multichoice here ...

They always make their subscriber pay for their Useless upgrading bill each time they do so! "Monopoly Market"

dead goat syndrome

abeg singlechoice or werin be the name sef, abeg we want it to be increased to N20,000 for full bouquet ooooo na werin we want so we can pay 1 yr
oshisko

$EBO wrote:

dead goat syndrome

Lolz

mcbesto wrote:

None of us using multichoice here ...

Me dey use ham o

explanation not straight forward, no competition for this people.