Streamer HBO Max has seen a solid uptick in the first quarter of 2022, the same period in which Netflix Inc (NASDAQ:NFLX) suffered its first-ever dip in subscriptions.
The Game of Thrones maker added 3mln subscribers sequentially, and 12.8mln subscribers year over year, whilst Netflix lost 200,000 subscribers.
According to telecoms firm AT&T, reporting its last quarterly numbers as parent of WarnerMedia, HBO Max and HBO had 76.8mln global subscribers as of March, with US domestic subscribers soaring 4.4mln to 48.6mln year-on-year.
WarnerMedia is now part of Warner Bros Discovery following AT&T's divestiture of its media division and officially merging it with Discovery earlier this month.
In the results from AT&T, which spun off WarnerMedia for US$43bn, it said the WarnerMedia unit was a drag on profitability with investment in the HBO platform and flash-in-pan CNN+ (which launched and canned within a month) contributing to a 32.7% slump in operating income year-over-year to US$1.3bn. Incremental ad-revenue sharing costs also added to the decline, the company said.
WarnerMedia's revenue for the first quarter totaled US$8.7bn, up 2.5% from a year ago. Subscription revenue, up 4.4% to US$4bn, was primarily driven by HBO Max, and higher content and other revenues.
Despite higher sports revenue, a drop of 3% in ad revenue to US$1.7bn was blamed on a decline in linear TV audiences and "tough comparisons" with the earlier year's political environment.
The monthly domestic subscriber average revenue per unit (ARPU) for HBO Max/HBO in the first quarter was US$11.24, down from US$11.72 in the first quarter of 2021, but still higher than the prior quarter.
AT&T chief John Stankey touted the company's biggest first-quarter postpaid phone net additions in more than a decade when presenting first quarter results.
"AT&T has entered a new era, meeting this opportunistic moment from a position of flexibility and strength thanks to our evolving networks, enhanced customer experience, growing 5G and fiber customer base and a much stronger balance sheet," Stankey said in a statement.
AT&T gets to unload a portion of its debt to Warner Bros Discovery and gets US$40bn in cash to help pay off debt.