MultiChoice is getting hammered
PressPulse’s latest media sentiment report shows that MultiChoice has suffered significant reputational damage after the Canal+ acquisition.
MultiChoice has long been criticised for the price of its DStv service, which had enjoyed a 20-year monopoly in the pay-TV market.
However, many people still subscribed to the service due to its excellent SuperSport offering and its quality entertainment.
Its technology was top-notch, its service levels were very good, and it was behind many iconic South African series, documentaries, and sports sponsorships.
For years, media reports about MultiChoice and DStv were a mix of positive developments and negativity towards the cost.
However, since Canal+ acquired MultiChoice and delisted the company from the Johannesburg Stock Exchange, sentiment shifted.
MultiChoice’s DStv service started to water down its offering, with what some described as its most aggressive content purge in years.
A significant blow came in January 2026, when four third-party channels were removed following the closure of Paramount Africa.
The same happened with sporting events. In a shock development, SuperSport did not carry the 2026 Winter Olympics. It has also cut niche events, such as the World Darts Championship.
Production houses for channels like kykNET and Mzansi Magic have reportedly faced delays in getting money, with local contracts piling up in Paris awaiting approval.
These issues have been blamed on Canal+’s cost-cutting measures in its attempts to turn MultiChoice around.
As part of the regulatory approval from the South African Competition Tribunal, Canal+ committed not to cut staff for three years.
This means that it has to find other areas where it can cut costs, which include SuperSport and DStv channels.
MultiChoice is getting hammered in the press
PressPulse’s latest media sentiment report showed that MultiChoice’s reputation has taken a hammering over the last three months.
PressPulse is an online media-sentiment tracking platform that developed a custom artificial intelligence (AI) system for measuring sentiment.
It tracks South Africa’s top business publications and measures companies’ success in achieving positive exposure in them.
The sentiment ranking is based on the number of positive, neutral, or negative articles and the reach and influence of the publication where they are published.
Each company is assigned a sentiment score. A positive score indicates overall positive exposure, while a negative score indicates negative exposure.
The score’s size indicates the impact of the exposure. A big positive score, for example, shows that a company enjoyed highly impactful positive exposure.
Press Pulse’s sentiment analysis showed that MultiChoice had a negative sentiment score of 21, which is unprecedented for the company.
Netflix, in comparison, has a stable positive sentiment score. This is what one could expect from an entertainment company.
The chart below shows MultiChoice’s media sentiment score over the last three months, with Netflix’s score as a benchmark.
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