Sky's clouds Plunging value and a looming cliff edge on content. What's gone wrong?

When the boss of the media multinational Comcast was putting together an ultimately eye-watering £31bn bid for Sky, he recounted how a chat with a London cab driver reinforced his opinion that he was in pursuit of a crown jewel of UK broadcasting.

- Mark Sweney

When the boss of the media multinational Comcast was putting together an ultimately eye-watering £31bn bid for Sky, he recounted how a chat with a London cab driver reinforced his opinion that he was in pursuit of a crown jewel of UK broadcasting. Brian Roberts's plan was to use Sky to build an international powerhouse outside the US - after being beaten by Disney in the battle to acquire his prime target, Rupert Murdoch's 21st Century Fox - but some analysts and industry figures wonder if he has been taken for a very expensive ride.

Seven years on and the value of Sky has been written down by almost a quarter, the broadcaster's stranglehold on new prestige TV shows and films has been broken, losses have soared at Sky News and bosses continue to deal with an embarrassing £300m advertising scandal.

"It is certainly not what Comcast dreamed," said one former senior Sky executive. "Of the big US businesses in the sector they were the least internationally diverse, and there was an arms race going on. They convinced themselves there was a lot of opportunity, that Sky would be the international launch pad. There was initially a lot of optimism there, but it hasn't been that beachhead."

Sky's most recent financial results underscore the tough market conditions it continues to navigate, re-engineering a business built on high-priced pay-TV packages as the streaming revolution reshapes broadcasting economics and viewer behaviour.

In 2023, operating losses doubled as Sky recorded a pre-tax loss of £773m, fuelled by a £1.2bn writedown in loans to its German and Italian operations, and a £327m impairment charge at the loss-making streaming service SkyShowtime, a joint venture with the US media behemoth and Channel 5's owner, Paramount.