A year ago News Corp was ahead of Hughes-owned DirecTV in terms of global customers. News Corp. commanded 29.7 per cent of all satellite pay-TV subscribers, compared with DirecTV’s 26.6 per cent market share. As at June this year the positions were reversed. Hughes was ahead with 35.4 per cent of the overall market, with News Corp’s market-share dropping to 24.2 per cent.

The data, calculated at June 30 each year, is drawn from News-backed platforms (BSkyB, Sky Latin America, Stream in Italy and SkyPerfect in Japan) while DirecTV’s data also includes its North and South American subscribers and for the first time includes PrimeStar subscribers.

Hughes Electronics, the Hughes division which includes DirecTV, last week declared its third-quarter 1999 results, reporting income from satellite broadcasting up 150 per cent from $459 million (Euro426 million) to $1.15 billion and positive cashflow at $48 million, up from the earlier negative $31 million. At the end of September DirecTV had 7.7 million subscribers in the US, having added 423,000 net new subscribers during the three months.

The Hughes satellite-building division saw income fall 26 per cent to $511 million, blamed largely on reduced involvement with the failed ICO LEO programme.