We've thought it to be coming for quite some time, given the string of bad news for XM and good news for SIRIUS. Today's second quarter numbers released from SIRI show SIRIUS outpacing XMSR in subscriber growth, a vitally important number for the two battling companies.
"Sirius, boosted by an exclusive deal with shock jock radio personality Howard Stern, said it added about 600,640 net new subscribers in the quarter, a 64 percent growth from the same period last year. It ended the quarter with 4.7 million subscribers, still short of XM's nearly 7 million subscribers.
XM said it added 398,000 net new subscribers, a 38 percent drop in net subscriber growth compared to last year's period curbed by new product availability. XM shares were flat in Nasdaq trade after falling as much as 5 percent before the market opened."
There's still a very long way to go before satellite radio becomes profitable. Continued strong growth does help to sway the doubting Thomas', and at least gets SIRIUS a bit closer to paying the bills.
Our sister blog Engadget is all a buzz about SIRIUS' first entry into the DAP market. Tech Effect even managed to snap a picture of the device when CEO Mel Karmazin briefly flashed it during his keynote at this week's Convergence 2.0 conference, and we were lucky enough to be tipped off.
No new concrete details but, SIRIUS promises that they'll have the new DAB in stores by the end of the summer.
Engadget expects to see more pictures and get more specs before the launch date, and we'll be sure to keep you posted.
Icon of American television, Barbara Walters, will be bringing her archived interviews to SIRIUS. Famous for her in-depth and sometimes teary interviews with top celebrities, Walters back-catalouge will get new life in the form of a weekly two-hour series starting early next year.
Also on the docket for SIRIUS subscribers will be a one-hour call in show produced four times a year and featuring Walters. The show, to be called "Ask Barbara Anything" appears to be a turn the tables concept, allowing the public to interview thier most beloved interviewer.
This is a really cool bit of content to add to the SIRIUS lineup. Some of Walter's older interviews, and some with now dead celebrities, should still hold up and remain as entertaining and engaging as they once were on ABC tv.
Go go market unification. Well, not just yet, but it could be coming. Even with regulatory "question marks" looming, Mel Karmazin says he'd buy XM if the price were right.
The merger idea has been floated before, and many are certain that a consolidation between the two is inevitable in the long term. Still, when Karmazin talks, people listen and when he talks about a buy out of rival XM, it gets everyone talking.
Not the least of which is long time industry cheerleader, The Motley Fool. In the Fool's analysis, "If it does happen, it's likely to happen sooner rather than later. If XM and Sirius hit their mark and start producing positive operating cash flow in a few quarters, a lot of the bearish sentiment that has been marinating the stocks in recent months will evaporate. Prices will start inching higher, creating less of an incentive for XM and Sirius to cash out, and the potential acquirers may not be willing to pay those higher prices."
The Motley's have a point. Profitable, these two are going to be giants to contend with in terms of stock price. They will have created a new industry, something that isn't easy to do. To the victor goes the spoils, as they say.
Everybody's a critic when it comes to start-ups. USA Today's Matt Krantz says he's bearish on SIRIUS, due to lackluster returns and the failure to turn a profit as of yet (You mean they're trying to make money?)
Krantz explains, "Satellite radio was a classic case. Shortly after the dot-com bust, investors looking for wild and exciting investment opportunities didn't lose any time investing in satellite radio. It seemed to have unlimited promise. And it didn't seem to matter that Sirius hadn't made a dime and analysts were torn on when, or if, profits would arrive."
Well true, but it takes time to build infrastructure and, the adoption rate of satellite radio is unparelleled in any other new broadcast medium so far in our history. I think Krantx is just a little ticked about Howard Stern making more money than should be legally allowed for someone who sits in front of a microphone, writing, "the biggest winner on the stock has been shock jock Howard Stern, who was paid $100 million a year plus given the opportunity to cash in $191 million in stock. You can read about Stern's mega payday here.
"[now] The stock is trading around $4.45 a share. That's a 13% decline since April 2005. Interestingly, too, investors haven't cashed in on Stern, either. The stock is down 35% since he started on the air. Meanwhile, the company still loses money, making it impossible to value the stock using any standard method."
I'm pretty sure that the momentum is in SIRIUS' favor. Mel Karmazin is a strong leader, and barring anything unforseen (like FCC regulation of content, or a few satellites crashing and burning) SIRIUS has a bright future.
"Crazy" Jim Cramer of CNBC's Mad Money says XM Satellite Radio (XMSR) and SIRIUS Satellite Radio (SIRI) are overvalued, and the satellite Radio industry as a whole has "peaked".
Citing market capitialization as too large, and pointing to XM's recent miss in subscriber number targets, Cramer says XMSR and SIRI only represent value now if they merge.
Cramer says on the short term, he would be long SIRI and short XMSR.
I'll agree on long SIRI and short XMSR but, I don't think mergers are where the butter for this bread lie, at least not yet. SIRI needs to capitalize and expound upon the recent gains it has made against XMSR in the market. SIRIUS has been on a rampage lately, and XM is facing some difficult and bumpy roads ahead in the form of lawsuits and legal battles.
If SIRIUS can launch useable and relevant video feeds soon, and well ahead of XM, they will have established a strong foothold in a market that didn't exist 3 years ago. History is written by the victorious, and I think SIRIUS will be writing the book on how Satellite Radio killed FM.
When John McHugh and Maggie Lee contacted SIRIUS' "Standard Time" channel to ask if they could play a few special requests during the couple's wedding reception, neither expected the 'reception' they've received.
"They e-mailed us back and asked us to send them a playlist, so we sent them our top 10 list," Lee said. "Tuesday they called and said, 'Hey, do you mind if we make this bigger?'"
Friday's wedding reception was attended by 50 people locally, and an unspecified number via satellite radio. DJ Lee Arnold of SIRIUS produced an entire broadcast focused on just this couple's wedding reception
"To my knowledge, that's the first time this has happened in the satellite radio industry," Brown said. "We just thought theirs was a neat little story."
To our knowledge, it's the largest nano-scale publicity stunt ever.
This whole Stern vs. O+A thing is getting out of hand, but I guess it sells radios. A Howard Stern fan approached Opie & Anthony during the XM "Walk Over" on Friday's show. The Stern fan first came up to the microphone and said, "This is Opie and Anthony's whole audience here? I just wanna say, uhm, Howard Stern has a huge [base, vulgar term for male genitalia] and I love him."
More inane quips one would expect from a diehard Stern (or OA) fan followed, until the Stern fan then threw Ben Sparks against a wall and was subdued by "Club Soda Kenny" and "Master Po" who pinned the Stern fan down and made him apologize on air. The Stern fan was held for the NYPD, who arrived an unspecified amount of time later.
Stern and OA are becoming the Rock-em-sock-em robots of XM and SIRIUS, allowing the companies to spar against each other in the press without actually, uh, sparring against each other in the press.
Orbitcast has audio of the whole thing. Not safe for work.
Will an appearance on SIRIUS' Howard Stern show help save Dustin Diamond's house? Who doesn't hope so?
The former child star from "Saved By The Bell" revealed on the Howard Stern show that he may lose his house, and is selling t-shirts online to make up for a $250,000 shortfall after the land owner called in a provision in his person-to-person mortgage.
He told Stern he needed to sell 30,000 t-shirts at his site, www.getdshirts.com to save his two-story suburban home.
It will be interesting to see how far a plea on Stern gets you since the switch to SIRIUS. I'm cheering for Dustin, I mean, he never got Lisa Turtle, he should at least keep his house.
The modifications required to get XM radios back in compliance with the FCC may be much smaller that we thought. When Forbes published an article that read "The FCC issue could be more pervasive than previously believed", we previously believed them. Pitty us, as the answer may be much closer to the mundane.
According to Orbitcast, the part needed isn't internal, it's simply a 25-cent ferrite bead. That's right, one of those funny little bumps on the cord may be the cause of all this ruckus. The little loop is used to dampen magnetic radiation emmitted from cables carrying electric current.
This is good news for everyone involved if its true. I'm still not certain this is the issue in question. Otherstories have pointed to the FM modulator being the problem that drew the ire of the FCC. If that's the case, I'm hard pressed to see how this fixes the issue.
SIRIUS Canada and BMW Canada today announced a long term exclusive agreement that will make Sirius satellite radio receivers an option for BMW vehicles sold in Canada.
Starting this fall, Sirius will be available in select Canadian BMW models bundled with a subscription to the satellite radio service. By 2007, all BMW models will be Sirius satellite-ready.
SIRIUS is really moving to position itself as not only a satellite-radio service but a mobile data system. BMW makes an excellent fit with SIRIUS' strategy, and I'm sure both parties are well aware of this. BMW's late model cars have a reputation for being loaded with tech-gadgets (sometimes to the point of annoyance. cough-"i-Drive"-cough). I'm sure the BMW execs are well aware (and probably more aware than public knowledge) of SIRIUS' future plans for data delivery to the automobile.
SIRIUS is racking up the exclusives in the Canadian market, with Subaru and VW already signed on for similar deals.
Today SIRIUS announced that NFL Legend Jerry Rice will be hosting a show on the SIRIUS NFL Radio (channel 124). This follows last week's announcement that Andrew Wilkow will be hosting a Conservative talk show on SIRIUS Patriot channel.
Last week, on June 8, SIRIUS announced that Andre Wilkow, who is called "the next generation of talk radio" according the the press release, will be starting a new show on August 1 this year. Wilkow has been hosting a daily talk show on WGY- AM in Albany NY, as well as a weekend show on WABC-AM in New Your City. He will be hosting a weekday show from 12-3pm ET, airing on Channel 144 SIRIUS Patriot. Wilkow said of his move "Moving to SIRIUS lets me take that style and passion nationwide. I am honored to be given this opportunity."
But the wait for Jerry Rice is much shorter, as he will start June 13th co-hosting "The Afternoon Blitz" from 3-7pm ET with Adam Schein. He will be heard part time, being only on three times a week throughout the year. Rice joins quite a team of past players that are currently on NFL Radio on SIRIUS. Other past NFL players on NFL Radio include Cris Carter, Randy Cross, Gil Brandt, Tim Ryan, Pat Kirwan, Solomon Wilcots and Adam Schein.
Space is about to get a little more crowded, and as a result your SIRIUS reception may be all the better. That's according to SIRIUS Satellite Radio and the satellite builder Loral.
Construction of the new satellite is expected to be completed in the fourth quarter of 2008. The satellite will be launched into a geostationary orbit to complement SIRIUS' existing three satellites, which were also manufactured by Space Systems/Loral and operate in a highly elliptical geosynchronous orbit. This unique hybrid constellation will hopefully provide unparalleled redundancy, enhanced coverage and exceptional performance.
Technical details on how reception will improve, what the satellite's planned footprint will be and what additional features might be supported by the new stationary platform are light so far. According to SpaceToday, the SIRIUS FM-5 satellite is a "high-power" 130-series spacecraft, able to generate over 20 kilowatts of power and will be equipped with a number of advanced technologies, including an unfurl-able 9-meter antenna. Rumor has it that the additional bandwidth and capability may be planned for use in streaming video delivery.
More signs that the XM SIRIUS battle is turning more SIRIUS than XM. Unaudited subscriber numbers published by XM this week have XM subscriptions in Canada (a relatively new market for both XM and SIRIUS) at 80,000.
XM Previously estimated 75,000 Canadian subscribers by August of this year, so on the surface this looks like a good thing for the recent litigation pincushion. However, SIRIUS, often the also-ran when it comes to total numbers of subscribers, and even available channels, claims 100,000 Canadian subscribers in a May announcement.
It's way to early to declare the tide turning in the battle between XM and SIRI but, continued signs like this continue to demonstrate that the race for king of satellite radio is far from over.
It's looking like the FCC issues that caused Audiovox to pull certain models of XM radios off of the market, and caused XM to voluntarily suspend sales of certain models of radios containing FM transmitters may be more widespread than previously thought.
According to Forbes, "The FCC issue could be more pervasive than previously believed," wrote analyst Jonathan Jacoby in a research note Tuesday. "We believe that XM and Sirius could temporarily suspend retail shipments of certain radios, but the fix would be relatively quick and inexpensive and likely would not lead to stock-outs at retail."
In all honesty, neither company needs this. Both XM and SIRIUS are relying on phenomenal growth numbers to help keep their stock values up while they continue to lose money while developing infrastructure and programming. Anything that slows subscriber growth could be bad news. 30 - 60 days of poor availability of radios in the retail market is a definite way to slow subscriber growth.
We've thought it to be coming for quite some time, given the string of bad news for XM and good news for SIRIUS. Today's second quarter numbers released from SIRI show SIRIUS outpacing XMSR in subscriber growth, a vitally important number for the two battling companies.
Icon of American television, Barbara Walters, will be bringing her archived interviews to SIRIUS. Famous for her in-depth and sometimes teary interviews with top celebrities, Walters back-catalouge will get new life in the form of a weekly two-hour series starting early next year. 
"Crazy" Jim Cramer of CNBC's Mad Money says XM Satellite Radio (XMSR) and SIRIUS Satellite Radio (SIRI) are overvalued, and the satellite Radio industry as a whole has "peaked". 
When John McHugh and Maggie Lee contacted SIRIUS' "Standard Time" channel to ask if they could play a few special requests during the couple's wedding reception, neither expected the 'reception' they've received. 
Will an appearance on SIRIUS' Howard Stern show help save Dustin Diamond's house? Who doesn't hope so? 
SIRIUS Canada and BMW Canada today announced a long term exclusive agreement that will make Sirius satellite radio receivers an option for BMW vehicles sold in Canada.
Space is about to get a little more crowded, and as a result your SIRIUS reception may be all the better. That's according to SIRIUS Satellite Radio and the satellite builder Loral. 
More signs that the XM SIRIUS battle is turning more SIRIUS than XM. Unaudited subscriber numbers published by XM this week have XM subscriptions in Canada (a relatively new market for both XM and SIRIUS) at 80,000. 
