Starhub

[lonewolf]

If you look at Starhub financials prior to '09, when they had the EPL rights, they were actually losing money.... even when lumped together with other more profitable Cable channels + Broadband (that was how they tried to hide in one segment) .... That was likely their main reason for not bidding too aggressively and 'allowing' Singtel to win... In Singtel's case, they badly needed EPL to jumpstart their fledging mioTV back then... Not sure about now tho'...

If we were to compare the losses Starhub were incurring for the EPL rights back then, it's no wonder they'd rather subsidise their subscribers now for those who wants to pay for the EPL channel (to Singtel)..

I doubt it was the case of Starhub not bidding aggressively and more a case of them underestimating how much more aggressive Singtel was going to bid.

The bill rebates offered by Starhub is a business decision and they are not doing it to reward Starhub subscribers; but to see how they can squeeze more revenue out of them. If it was a reward, then it would have been a simple outfront bill rebate without any pre-condition (other than you need to sign up for the BPL). But they contract you for 24 month for Surf and Watch and in the process, squeeze more revenue out of you. At the end of the day, $12.50 per month bill rebate is small compared to how much more you have to pay to qualify for the bill rebates.

Only a BPL die-hard would fall for it.