{"id":650926,"date":"2026-05-29T15:00:01","date_gmt":"2026-05-29T13:00:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/?p=650926"},"modified":"2026-05-29T15:07:28","modified_gmt":"2026-05-29T13:07:28","slug":"making-dstv-great-again","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/broadcasting\/650926-making-dstv-great-again.html","title":{"rendered":"Making DStv great again"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Groupe Canal+ is preparing a secondary inward listing on the JSE while trying to turn around DStv, as the South African pay-TV giant is now key to its African growth plans after Showmax failed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The listing fulfilled a commitment Canal+ made during the MultiChoice acquisition, and the French media group\u2019s shares are set to begin trading on the JSE\u2019s main board on Wednesday, 3 June 2026.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Its pre-listing announcement said the listing would give South African investors direct exposure to Canal+ after MultiChoice\u2019s JSE delisting at the end of 2025.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The company said South African investors would trade its shares in rand, while the stock would remain fully fungible with its London-listed shares.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Canal+ described MultiChoice as Africa\u2019s leading entertainment platform, with products including DStv, GOtv, M-Net, SuperSport, Irdeto, and KingMakers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

According to the pre-listing statement, the combined group had more than 42 million subscribers globally at the end of 2025, operating in over 70 countries and employing around 15,000 people.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Canal+ said its Africa and Asia segment had 23 million pay-TV subscribers across more than 40 countries, with content in over 50 languages.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

However, DStv was in serious trouble<\/a> when Canal+ took over the MultiChoice Group, reporting rapidly declining subscriber numbers and revenue.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

DStv\u2019s subscriber numbers peaked at 17.3 million in March 2023 and have been in decline since then.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Canal+ no longer breaks down DStv subscribers by region or by the market segmentation of its packages.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

However, MultiChoice\u2019s integrated annual report for the year that ended 31 March 2025 revealed that the number of DStv subscribers in South Africa declined by 589,000.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

MultiChoice reported subscriber declines in South Africa each year from 2021 to 2025, and it was likely that this trend continued into 2026.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In 2025, it was striking that all segments of the DStv subscriber base declined, indicating an accelerating trend.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The premium base, which included Compact Plus and DStv Premium, declined by 96,000 subscribers. This represented a year-on-year decline of 9%.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

MultiChoice\u2019s middle-market subscribers declined by 99,000, representing a year-on-year reduction of 5% among DStv Compact and Commercial package subscribers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The mass-market tier, including DStv Access and DStv Family, was down by 394,000, a year-on-year decline of 9%. This was the second year it experienced a decline.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Significant growth opportunity \u2014 Canal+<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Canal+ said Sub-Saharan Africa remained a significant growth opportunity, supported by population growth, rising GDP, electrification, and low streaming service penetration.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

However, to achieve its growth ambitions, Canal+ needs to improve DStv\u2019s performance. MultiChoice had previously billed Showmax as its engine for future growth, but that proved a costly mistake.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Canal+ labelled Showmax an expensive failure and shut the South African streaming platform down on 30 April 2026 as part of its turnaround plan.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

MultiChoice attributed roughly R8.7 billion in trading losses over three financial years to Showmax\u2019s relaunch, content acquisition, and platform licensing fees.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The pre-listing statement showed Showmax revenue fell from \u20ac12 million (R227 million) in the first quarter of 2025 to \u20ac9 million (R170 million) in the first quarter of 2026.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Canal+\u2019s 2025 results showed MultiChoice revenue dropped by \u20ac142 million, or R2.69 billion, while the broadcaster lost roughly half a million subscribers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

MultiChoice contributed \u20ac2.4 billion in revenue and 14.4 million subscribers to the combined Canal+ group.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

However, MultiChoice\u2019s free cash flow for the year was -\u20ac42 million, compared with a positive \u20ac489 million from Canal+\u2019s historical perimeter, excluding Vietnam.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Canal+\u2019s turnaround plan<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
\"\"
David Mignot, Canal+ Africa CEO<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Canal+ previously said it would spend up to \u20ac100 million (R1.9 billion) to support MultiChoice\u2019s turnaround and sustainable growth.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

That included reducing headcount at the MultiChoice headquarters and at the cybersecurity subsidiary Irdeto through voluntary severance packages, and hiring 1,000 additional field sales staff.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Canal+ said its recovery plan was built around four pillars: better content, clearer commercial propositions, stronger distribution, and operational excellence at scale.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The first pillar focuses on improving the content proposition in Africa through joint products, in-house channels, global partnerships, and local production.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Canal+ said producing many hours of African local content and retaining key sports rights remained cornerstones of the MultiChoice business.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The second pillar focuses on simplifying MultiChoice\u2019s commercial propositions by clarifying pricing, strengthening branding, and improving marketing across its markets.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The third pillar aims to grow subscribers by lowering entry costs through hardware subsidies, expanding distribution, and strengthening its salesforce.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Canal+ has also said it would expand points of sale, grow its installer base, and increase marketing and branding investment across Africa.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The fourth pillar, operational excellence at scale, included voluntary severance packages at MultiChoice support functions and the restructuring of Irdeto.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Canal+ said these measures would improve operational efficiency through best practices and a standardised operating model across the group\u2019s markets.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The company said it expected to unlock over \u20ac400 million in adjusted earnings before interest and tax cost synergies and over \u20ac300 million in free cash flow synergies from 2030.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

However, Canal+\u2019s cost-cutting plan is constrained in South Africa by merger conditions that block retrenchments for three years.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Competition Commission has clarified that voluntary severance packages are not covered by the moratorium, giving Canal+ some room to reduce staff.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

With Canal+ taking control in September 2025, the retrenchment moratorium is expected to expire in 2028, before its 2030 cost savings targets.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

MultiChoice’s new owner, French media titan Group Canal+, has already committed \u20ac100 million to a strategy aimed at reviving DStv\u2019s fortunes.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":15,"featured_media":640134,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":true,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[24],"tags":[101596,85,66933,475],"class_list":["post-650926","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-broadcasting","tag-canal-africa","tag-dstv","tag-groupe-canal","tag-multichoice"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/650926"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/15"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=650926"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/650926\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":650929,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/650926\/revisions\/650929"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/640134"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=650926"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=650926"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=650926"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}