Television costs: Vodafone is in the TV business in the downward suction

Although a consequent change in the law was now a long time ago, the telecommunications provider Vodafone continues to lose ground in the television business. In the fourth quarter of the financial year expired at the end of March, the number of TV customers fell by 81,000 to around 8.8 million, the company said in Düsseldorf.

In the third quarter it was a minus of 66,000. It is surprising that the downward trend has now reinforced a little again. Because the consequences of the change in the law no longer played a role in the fourth quarter. Nevertheless, the downward bend continues, as the latest figures show.

Legislators have tipped ancillary cost privilege

Since the beginning of July, landlords have not been allowed to convert the costs for a TV connection to their tenants via the additional cost accounting. Vodafone had given this decades of practice to a significant advantages at the television market, since millions of tenants were to a certain extent automatically customers – whether they wanted or not, they were part of mass contracts between their landlord and Vodafone. Competitors like Deutsche Telekom with Magenta TV had a difficult time.

It is now different, the “ancillary cost privilege” has been history since last summer. Since then, tenants either have to conclude contracts with a provider or voluntarily join a contractual construct that runs away from the additional cost accounting. Many customers returned Vodafone and switched to Magenta TV, Zattoo or Waipu – or they fell completely out of the market because they were enough for normal Internet access. For example, you can see public service broadcasters in the ARD media library without having extra costs.

Vodafone felt the market change significantly last year, in the summer quarter of 2024 the number of TV customers in Germany dropped by 2.2 million. In the autumn quarter, the minus weakened significantly. At that time, however, Germany boss Marcel de Groot was confident and said that the customer decline triggered by the change in the law had been “almost stopped”.

Now it turns out that Vodafone remains under pressure on the market and the competitive pressure is high. With around 8.8 million customers, the television business is important for the provider, so Vodafone remains in first place in Germany in this market segment – as the market leader, the company has a lot to lose.

Competitor Telekom is on the upper with his Magenta TV. In his television business, the Bonn group was able to increase 37,000 contract customers in the annual start-up quarter. All in all, the television growth at Telekom is rather sobering in the past quarters, especially since the group spent a lot of money on advertising.

Vodafone’s operating profit sags

Vodafone Germany boss de Groot evaluates the business figures of his company positively. “Against the background of the loss of the levy of TV costs and a tightened competition, we are working all the more intensely on the company’s transformation,” he said. The goal was to keep half of the TV contracts affected by the law amendment at Vodafone. He also indicates the slight increase in mobile phone contract customers.

Vodafone came up in Germany in the 2024/25 fiscal year on a service turnover of 10.9 billion euros, five percent less than a year earlier. In the landline division, the proceeds even dropped by 8.1 percent to 5.9 billion euros. The overall operating result (EBITDAAL) fell by 12.6 percent to 4.4 billion euros. The main reason for the negative development was customer losses in the television business.