Earnings Call Excerpt
Here’s the entire text of the prepared remarks from Univision Communications’ (ticker: UVN) Q3 2005 conference call. The Q&A is here.
November 2, 2005 5:00 p.m. ET
Moderator: Ray RodriguezOperator:
Welcome to today’s Univision Third Quarter Earnings call. Today’s call is being recorded.
Some of the information discussed today will contain forward-looking statements within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. These statements involve risks and uncertainties, including those relating to Univision’s future success and growth. Actual results may differ materially due to risks and uncertainties described in Univision’s filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission. Univision assumes no obligation to update forward-looking information discussed on today’s call.
On today’s call we have Ray Rodriguez, President and Chief Operating Officer; Andy Hobson, Chief Financial Officer and Chief Strategic Officer; and Diana Vesga, Vice President.
I will now turn the call over to Ray Rodriguez. Please go ahead.
Ray Rodriguez:Thank you, operator. Good afternoon, everyone, and thank you for joining us today. We’re pleased that our third quarter performance exceeded our expectations. More importantly, we see improving results in the fourth quarter and have great momentum into 2006 with a strong Upfront and record revenues for the World Cup. We ended our Upfront with impressive growth in the mid 20s percent range over the previous year, and as Andy will tell you in a few minutes, we expect to start feeling the positive impact of our strong season in fourth quarter of this year.
In the third quarter, our television and radio businesses turned in improving financial and operational performances, and continued to prove to the marketplace the unmatched reach of our properties to U.S. Hispanics. In a quarter that included the start of the fall season, the Univision Network grew its audiences more than ABC, CBS, NBC or FOX to reach record highs, and our radio group saw growth in key markets as well as at our new Reggaeton-formatted stations.
Earlier today we announced that Univision has obtained the exclusive Spanish-language broadcast rights to the 2010 and 2014 FIFA World Cup tournaments, in addition to 26 other popular FIFA soccer events through 2014, for $325 million. As you know, the World Cup tournaments bring tremendous ratings and revenues to our Company. In fact, our sales of the 2006 World Cup have already reached $180 million, and we still have inventory left to sell.
The sport of soccer is experiencing tremendous growth and popularity in the United States, and we’re thrilled to be part of it. Thirty-five million people watched our World Cup broadcast in 2002, despite the fact that because the games were live from Korea, most of the broadcasts were in the middle of the night. In 2006, we’re expecting more than 50 million fans to tune in. We have been the exclusive U.S. Spanish-language broadcaster of the World Cup since 1978 and we’re pleased to be able to continue our exclusive coverage into the next decade.
Looking at the new ’05-’06 season and the fourth quarter, TeleFutura is showing some promising progress in primetime with our new, first-of-its-kind, live weeknight primetime news and information program, ?En Vivo y Directo.
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