Fremantle grows 27% as owner RTL’s revenue climbs to $5 billion

Bertelsmann’s Luxembourg media giant RTL Group, which owns Fremantle, has announced revenues of 5.06 billion euros ($4.97 billion) for the first nine months of 2022, a 12% growth over the corresponding period in the year 2021

RTL Group has stakes in 56 television channels, eight streaming services and 36 radio stations. The group’s content company, Fremantle, is one of the world’s largest creators, producers and distributors of scripted and unscripted content, including American Idol, Britain’s Got Talent and The X Factor.

The RTL Group announced that group revenues had increased primarily thanks to the strong performance of Fremantle and RTL Nederland, scope effects at RTL Germany from the acquisitions of Gruner + Jahr and Super RTL and positive exchange rate effects.

Fremantle’s revenue rose 27.8% to €1.65 billion. Consolidated revenue rose 18.9% to 1.7 billion euros in the third quarter of 2022 as strong growth in Fremantle and streaming revenues more than offset lower TV advertising revenues, the group said. The TV advertising revenue market was mixed, with Germany and France down 7% and 2% respectively, while the Netherlands grew 10.7%. The group’s circulation revenues rose by 2.8% to €329 million.

RTL+ and Videoland’s streaming revenues grew by 20.4% to €195 million thanks to the rapidly growing number of paying subscribers. At the end of September 2022, RTL Group had registered 4.7 million paying subscribers for its streaming services RTL+ in Germany and Videoland in the Netherlands, 40.6% more than in the previous year.

Overall, the group is revising its sales forecast to around 7.2 billion euros – the previous forecast was 7.3 to 7.5 billion euros. The company expects adjusted EBITA (earnings before interest, taxes and amortization) to be between EUR 1.05 and 1.15 billion in 2022, including start-up losses of up to EUR 250 million.

Thomas Rabe, CEO of RTL Group, said: “Looking ahead to the fourth quarter, we expect the advertising market environment to remain challenging, particularly in Germany. Despite these and numerous external factors, notably the war in Ukraine, inflation, energy supplies and the supply chain, RTL Group expects to meet the adjusted EBITA guidance published in August.”