US media company Comcast has said the Sochi winter Olympics generated over $1.1bn (€797.1m) in revenue, with its NBCUniversal division’s broadcasts of the 2014 Games making a significant contribution to a first quarter net income rise of 30 per cent.
Comcast said profit in the first quarter ending March 31, 2014 came to $1.87bn compared with $1.44bn in the year-earlier period. Revenue rose 14 per cent to $17.41bn compared with $15.3bn a year earlier. Without the winter Olympics, revenue rose 6.5 per cent to $16.3bn.
Revenue for NBCU increased 28.8 per cent to $6.9bn in the first quarter of 2014 compared to $5.3bn in the first quarter of 2013, primarily driven by 2014 Sochi Olympics revenue of $1.1bn included in the broadcast television and cable networks segments. Excluding the Olympics, NBCU revenue increased 8.1 per cent.
For the first quarter of 2014, revenue from the cable networks segment increased 12.6 per cent to $2.5bn compared to $2.2bn in the first quarter of 2013 and included $257m of revenue generated by the Sochi Olympics.
Revenue from the broadcast television segment increased 72.8 per cent to $2.6bn compared to $1.5bn in the first quarter of 2013 and included $846m of revenue generated by the Olympics.