The company's net income came to $672m, or $1.01 for each share, compared with $271m, or 40 cents a share.
Discovery, Inc. has reached 18m total paid streaming subscribers to-date, seven months after the January 4 debut of its SVOD platform Discovery+, the company revealed in a statement about its Q2 earnings.
Discovery reported that it ended Q1 with 13m global next-generation-paying, direct-to-consumer (D2C) subscribers and had reached a cross-portfolio total of 15m as of April 28. Discovery+ costs $4.99 per month with ads or $6.99 without ads.
For the quarter ended 30 June 2021, the company reported total revenue of $3.062bn, an increase of 21% compared with the same quarter a year ago. Advertising revenues both in the US and globally were a key driver. The former increased 12% on an annual basis and US distribution revenues increased 12%. For international markets, advertising revenues leapt 88% and distribution revenues rose 11% compared with the end of Q2 of 2020. Net income was $672m and total adjusted OIBDA was $1.117bn.
Overall, Discovery+ features more than 55,000 episodes from more than 2,500 series across Discovery’s networks, including HGTV, Food Network, TLC, ID, OWN, Travel Channel, Discovery Channel and Animal Planet.
Soon, Discovery will be the owner of another streaming service, HBO Max, as the company is set to acquire its owner, WarnerMedia, from AT&T. That will give Discovery plenty more built-in customers, with HBO and HBO Max currently boasting a combined 47m US subscribers, per AT&T’s Q2 earnings results, which were revealed July 22.
That number encompasses Discovery’s entire portfolio, including international direct-to-consumer products, like Eurosport Player and GolfTV. But the majority of that 18m figure comes from Discovery+, per Discovery, though the company did not provide a specific breakdown.
As far as the Olympics go, Discovery touted “record engagement,” saying that “more than 275m viewers have watched the games so far. Over 100m of those have watched through Discovery’s coverage on TV and digital, and an additional 175m more have watched the games through Discovery’s sub-license agreements with partner free-to-air broadcasters around Europe.”
In June 2021, the company completed the sale of its Great American Country linear network and recorded a pre-tax gain of $76m, or $0.09 per diluted share on an after-tax basis on the transaction. Additionally, the company recorded a pre-tax gain of $82m, or $0.09 per diluted share on an after-tax basis, related to a fair value adjustment for Sharecare.
In a statement, David Zaslav, President and Chief Executive Officer of Discovery said: “Discovery delivered very strong results this quarter as we executed well amidst a recovering global advertising market. Advertising revenue increased in every region of the globe and accelerated throughout the quarter, particularly in our International segment as revenue increased 70%. Indeed, many key markets such as the UK, Italy, Germany, as well as a number of Latam and APAC markets, all demonstrated a marked resurgence and finished ahead of 2019. We continued to steadily execute in our emerging next-generation businesses, with 17m paying direct-to-consumer subscribers at the end of the quarter, and 18m as of today. This contributed to 130% revenue growth in Q2. Our first Summer Olympic Games have thus far been a success, supporting healthy viewing and subscriptions across both our linear and streaming platforms, and underscores the importance of our commitment and investment in marquee IP. We continue to fire on all cylinders, and I am very pleased with our momentum as we work to complete our transformational WarnerMedia transaction.”
