Paramount Global reported a 10% year-over-year increase in third-quarter revenue from direct-to-consumer services, a result spurred in part by the addition of 3.5 million subscribers for Paramount+.
Paramount+ now has 72 million subscribers globally, with average revenue per customer in Q3 expanding by 11% year over year. The subscription video-on-demand platform continues to lose money for its corporate parent, but it is expected to finally reach profitability next year.
Paramount’s solid DTC quarter also included an 18% yoy bump in advertising sales, a result jointly yielded by Paramount+ and free ad-supported streaming service Pluto TV, the latter of which is already profitable.
On Friday’s Q3 earnings call with equity analysts, Brian Robbins — one of the three “co-CEO’s” guiding Paramount Global until its pending purchase by Skydance Media is completed next year — said that the media company is prepared to continue on with Paramount+ as a standalone business, but it’s also continuing to look for outside partnerships.
“We’re seeing real momentum at Paramount+ and at Pluto,” he added. “But you can expect us to be opportunistic.”
Paramount+ continues to be driven by producer Taylor Sheridan’s mega-popular stable of series. The Sept. 15 season-2 premiere of Sheridan’s Tulsa King, for example, yielded the No. 1 global debut in Paramount+ history, the media conglomerate said Friday.
The return of the NFL and college football on the platform in September also spurred signups and engagement, with pro-football streaming up 50% year-over-year.
Paramount executives also joined a growing number of media and telecom executives lauding Charter Communications’ strategy of bundling SVOD services with pay TV subscriptions.
“We’re actually quite pleased with the sub growth we’re seeing” from the Paramount-Charter carriage deal, Robbins noted.
Outside of streaming, however, Paramount’s legacy businesses continue to struggle in the aftermath of the crippling Hollywood guild strikes of 2023, with the linear TV and theatrical pipelines still experiencing lower volumes of output.
A softer linear TV ad market also has had an impact, with ad sales in the July-September quarter down 2% at CBS.
There are plenty of Q4 green shoots. On the CBS Television Network, hourlong drama Tracker, which was the No. 1 scripted series on broadcast TV last season, is once again top-ranked. It debuted its second season to 15 million multi-platform viewers in October, up 25% from its time-period debut last year.
Chuck Lorre’s Young Sheldon spinoff Georgie and Mandy’s First Marriage, meanwhile, is the No. 1 new comedy.
And on Sunday, the final six episodes of Sheridan’s seminal series, Yellowstone, debut on basic cable’s Paramount Network and on Paramount+ internationally.
On the film side, filmmaker Ridley Scott’s highly anticipated Gladiator 2 is expected to be one of the biggest movies of the fourth quarter.
Also, Paramount embarked earlier this year on a bloody quest to trim $500 million worth of expenses, which included the layoff of 15% of its workforce. Ninety-percent of that goal has been achieved, the company said.
Still, overall, third-quarter revenue was down 6% for Paramount to $6.73 billion.