SABC’s online video streaming platform has tripled its user base in less than a year to 1.5-million, growing well ahead of guidance given by the national broadcaster at the start of 2025.
The public broadcaster is working to increase its revenue, in part by monetising its digital platforms.
Earlier this year, the Treasury said it expected the SABC to report a profit of almost R1bn for the first time in more than five years in the 2026/27 financial year. As part of a broader effort to commercialise its digital properties, the public broadcaster had aimed to double the number of users on its online video streaming platform SABC+ to 1-million by 2027/28.
“The digital platform, specifically SABC+, has grown faster than we had planned. Our registered users have already exceeded 1.5-million,” Tendai Matore, acting CFO at the SABC, told Business Day.
“In terms of user acquisition, we are doing better than we had initially planned and the expectation is that number continues to grow.”
In March, SABC+ users were reported at 500,000.
Digital commercialisation
“We have already started commercialisation of the SABC+ platform. Obviously, we are at an early stage of that commercialisation, but the current numbers and our trading results leave us hopeful that we are on the right track and we can indeed derive some significant revenue diversification in the medium term.”
The company is also seeking to capitalise on its digital presence across channels such as Facebook, Instagram, TikTok and YouTube.
This comes as the auditor-general has, for a second consecutive year, issued an unqualified audit opinion on the corporation’s financial statements for the year ended March 2025.
Rising costs weigh on profitability
The group saw a modest 1.3% growth in revenue to R5.152bn which was outpaced by a 3% rise in expenditure to R5.435bn. Overall, the corporation recorded a net loss of R253.3m for the period.
According to Matore, the path to profit is currently dependent on growing revenues as expenses are quite fixed in the short to medium term.
Matore explains that SABC is one of the most commercially driven public broadcasters in the world. This is because funding from its parent, the state, only accounts for 3% of its budget. The company has to compete with the likes of MultiChoice, now Canal+, eMedia, Primedia, African Media Entertainment and others to fund the rest of its budget, particularly around advertising.
Revenues for the SABC are primarily made up of advertising, sponsorships and license fees. At R2.782bn, advertising made up the lion's share of income, 54%, for the period.
The top three top expense drivers for the public broadcaster are content, labour and employee costs and signal distribution.
Content and labour drive major expenses
The SABC's investment in content is currently about R1.2bn per annum.
The SABC is said to operate the largest newsroom on the African continent, with broadcasts in 16 languages. As such, the workforce to make this happen is the company’s largest expense.
“We have a footprint in all the provinces. We deliver our mandate across all platforms, from sports, news, documentaries, religion and children’s content. So it does require significant investment in just the human capital,” Matore said.
Employee costs were R1.9bn, accounting for 35% of expenditure.
The company’s public interest mandate cost about R2.1bn per annum to deliver. “Securing government funding for this remains a critical priority and is a central feature of the SABC Bill currently under review,” said the broadcaster in its latest annual report, recently tabled to parliament.
Signal distribution, which is done through Sentech, cost the broadcaster R717m in the period.
Pushing up revenue to offset these expense is why the group is focused on growing its digital channels as a new line of income.
“In the last couple of weeks we have also brought on board digital specialist partners and solid industry players to help us with the scale and skills to further exploit our digital platforms,” said Matore.
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