Sky profits and revenues rise amid £26bn bidding war between Fox and Comcast

Satellite television giant hails success of programmes such as Patrick Melrose, starring Benedict Cumberbatch, for lifting operating profits

After strong customer growth in the last three months, Sky now has 23 million subscribers across Europe (Reuters)

Sky’s earnings have risen 7 per cent, helped by 270,000 new subscribers, as it remains in the middle of a takeover battle between potential buyers 21st Century Fox and Comcast.

The satellite television giant hailed the success of programmes such as Patrick Melrose, starring Benedict Cumberbatch, which helped operating profits increase to £1.03bn for the year to 30 June, up from £964m a year ago.

After strong customer growth in the last three months, Sky now has 23 million subscribers across Europe.

The positive results could further fire up a bidding war between Fox and Comcast, the US cable company that also owns Universal Studios and the NBC network.

Comcast has so far tabled the highest offer of £26bn for Sky, bettering Rupert Murdoch’s Fox’s valuation by £1.5bn.

It is now up to Fox whether it wants to increase its £14-per-share bid for the 69 per cent of Sky it doesn’t already own.

The government expressed concerns over media plurality if the takeover went ahead but has now given Fox the green light to pursue the deal, as long as it sells off Sky News to Disney and ensures the service is adequately funded for 15 years.

Sky’s pre-tax profits increased 7.6 per cent to £864m on like-for-like revenues of £13.6bn.

The company said advertising revenues were up 6 per cent, while the rate at which customers are leaving dropped to its lowest for 10 years.

Viewing of Sky’s dramas jumped by half in the last year as it invested more in original programmes.

Jeremy Darroch, group chief executive of Sky, said: “We’ve grown every year since we launched in 1989 and we’re not slowing down.

“Today, Sky is bigger and doing more for customers than ever before – and we’re proud that is being recognised globally.”

Sky has pledged to boost spending on producing its own shows by a further 25 per cent in the face of competition for viewers from streaming services such as Netflix and Amazon Prime, both of which have multi-billion dollar production budgets.