Sky subscribers near 9 million

Satellite group BSkyB added 56,000 new customers in the first quarter of 2008 to take its customer base to almost 9 million. It was the best performance in the new year quarter, a traditionally slack time for sales, for three years.

Sky now has a total of 8,888,000 pay-TV customers in the UK and Ireland, keeping it on track to hit 10 million by 2010. The company said that it had signed up another 262,000 customers to its personal video recorder service Sky+, putting it in 3,393,000 households, or 38% of its overall base.

Sky Broadband customer numbers were up 229,000 to reach 1,428,000 at the end of March, less than two years after the service was launched. The company aims to have 3 million broadband customers, or 30% of its subscriber base, by 2010.

Sky said it added 43,000 high-definition subscribers, taking its tally to 465,000 at the end of March. Its Sky Talk telephone business grew by 180,000 to 1,095,000. Churn, a measure of how many customers left the service, was 10.5%, while Arpu - average revenue per user - hit a record £424.

The company reported a loss of £118m over the nine months to the end of March, factoring in a £474m impairment resulting from the fall in the value of its 17.9% stake in ITV. This impairment charge included £131m added in the January and March quarter to reflect the continuing decline in ITV's share price.

Sky bought its shares in November 2006 at 135p, more than double the stock's closing price last night of 64.4p. Sky also reported that revenues were up 10% over the same period to £3.706bn, while its operating profit for the period was £504m, down 18% on last year.

Menawhile, Digital channel Rapture TV will seek permission to go to the Court of Appeal after losing a case in which it claimed Sky overcharged the channel for its electronic listing. Last month Rapture lost its Competition Appeal Tribunal case – seen as a test case for the industry. If Rapture had won it could have thrown open the doors for other channels to challenge their Sky EPG charges, while Ofcom would also have had to re-examine how it investigates such cases.

Rapture was screened on Sky's digital satellite service but now airs on the internet after complaining that its annual EPG bill of nearly £76,800 from Sky was "unduly high", given that its annual turnover was under £150,000. Although Rapture lost its CAT case, the firm's chief executive, David Henry, has vowed to fight on. He has asked his MP Alistair Darling to write to Sky on his behalf and is writing an open letter to other licence holders on the Sky platform calling on the European Commission to bring action against Sky.

Former clubbing channel Rapture was broadcast on Sky between June and August 2002, and from May 2003 until July 2004, before relaunching once again as an entertainment station in November 2005. It was removed by Sky in March last year following the current dispute.

Rapture is hoping to win leave to appeal from the CAT after the channel claimed that Ofcom did not fully investigate its complaint that BSkyB had overcharged it for its EPG listing. Rapture claimed the EPG fee was bringing the channel "to its knees" and claimed Sky had breached its regulatory obligations by offering unfair listing terms.

However, Ofcom cleared Sky of overcharging in February last year, saying the price had been "fair, reasonable and non-discriminatory". Henry told MediaGuardian.co.uk that he believed he had more evidence that would help his case. He said: "We believe that there are not only grounds for us to appeal but also a misunderstanding by regulators of what an EPG is. We also understand that Ofcom has accepted from Sky a Sky programme model that is highly confidential and shows all the costs and revenue from Sky's businesses."

At last month's tribunal Henry said that Rapture had been unable to prove Sky's charges were exaggerated because it did not have access to the satellite broadcaster's business model. However, the tribunal ruling said that Rapture had not applied during the appeal for disclosure of the model.

Henry's lawyers will lodge Rapture's request for leave to take the case to the Court of Appeal before close of play today. However, Henry said he had been told it was unlikely the case would be heard until next year.