Kuala Lumpur – Astro Malaysia Holdings Berhad (Astro) announced its results for the first half of the financial year ending 31 January 2017, with year on year (YoY) modest growth in revenue and PATAMI, underpinned by better performance in e-commerce and Adex. EBITDA decreased 6% YoY primarily due to currency depreciation impacting content costs.

Tun Zaki Azmi, Chairman of Astro said, “The Group remains focused on delivering long-term shareholder returns and progressive dividend policy. The Board is pleased to declare a second interim dividend of 3 cent per share, 9% higher compared to the same period last year.”

Dato’ Rohana Rozhan, Group Chief Executive Officer of Astro said, “We are now serving 5 million or 69% of Malaysian households (3.5mn Pay-TV and 1.5mn NJOI) with growth primarily driven by our subscription-free TV service, NJOI (+ 38% YoY). Our challenge is to provide a choice of content, products, services, value propositions and customer experiences which is second to none. To achieve this, we will focus on getting to know our customers better by deploying data analytics and increasing our marketing efforts to raise customer awareness of the plethora of best in class products and services we now offer including On Demand (OD), Download to Go, mobile broadband plans, seamless access to multiple devices and more Same Day Date content, among others. Viewership has increased with real time second screen engagement via Astro on the Go (AOTG), content mobile apps and through integrating social media onto our content delivery platforms.”