Paris-based satellite operator Eutelsat delivered its Q1 financials after the market closed on October 29th. They were positive, other than for its Video division which saw revenues fall 7.3 per cent. Its Video income now represents just 51 per cent of overall revenues, and while the continued decline in Video is disappointing, Eutelsat is doing very well in its other key sectors.

Video revenue was €152 billion, down 7.3 per cent y-o-y and 4.5 per cent q-o-q. On the commercial front, Eutelsat secured a number of contracts, notably with the renewal of its agreements with key customers including Al-Jazeera for broadcast in the Middle East, Cable Color for Latin America. Elsewhere, Eutelsat secured a new partnership with TVPlus for coverage of Australia and New Zealand, confirming Eutelsat 172B as one of the new go-to positions for broadcasters in the region.

Its Fixed Connectivity division, which now represents 19 percent of overall revenues, saw growth of 30.1 per cent y-o-y to €57 million. However, on a quarter-by-quarter basis revenue was down 30.9 per cent but this was due to a high level of equipment sales as well as the recognition of catch-up revenues which boosted Q4 FY24. This quarter-year (to September 30th) revenues mainly reflected the acceleration in LEO services, driven by the NEOM contract won by OneWeb for the Saudi Arabian ‘City of the Future’, as well as calendar effect of the entry into service of Konnect VHTS in Q2 FY24. It also won a contract with SoftBank to deliver connectivity for businesses and government agencies throughout Japan and marking Eutelsat’s entry into the Japanese market.

Government Services (16 per cent of overall total) grew 20.3 per cent y-o-y to €46 million and were “broadly stable” when measured against the previous quarter-year.

Mobile Connectivity (14 per cent of overall total) stood at €42 million, up 18.8 per cent y-o-y. They mainly reflected the ongoing strong growth of LEO-based connectivity solutions, as well as GEO solid performances, notably in aviation. On a q-o-q basis, revenues were down by 14.6 per cent, notably due to equipment revenues recognised in Q4 FY24. On the commercial front, Inmarsat Maritime, a Viasat company, selected Eutelsat’s OneWeb low Earth orbit network for integration into its NexusWave fully managed connectivity solution.

Eutelsat’s backlog stands at €3.9 billion (€3.4 billion the previous year).

Eutelsat CFO Christophe Caudrelier, answering an analyst’s question, gave a modest update on the EU’s IRIS2 multi-satellite proposal, saying that whikle he could not say much, Eutelsat was “really positive and optimistic on this”. He added that – if the proposal went ahead – then it could replace its own 2nd Generation OneWeb strategy. He explained that the IRIS2 satellite members of the consortium (Eutelsat, SES and Hispasat) would have access to some of the capacity on the new system’s low Earth orbit bandwidth. He stressed that OneWeb would continue to exist.

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Categories: Articles, Business, Results, Satellite

Tags: eutelsat, iris2