Freeview is touting an increase in TV viewing habits, tightened consumer spending, and the improved affordability of its High Definition receivers as the drivers for its increased uptake.

The latest sales figures for the three months ending June 2009 show the total number of households able to receive Freeview is 255,048.

Breaking the numbers down there are 167,328 homes with Freeview satellite and 87,720 homes with Freeview HD.

Sky TV’s half year result seems to have surprised most market predictions, dropping profit on some bad luck, bad decisions and a bad economy.

Sky TV has surprised many analysts by presenting a fall in profit at its half year results, blamed on falling ad revenues and capital expenditure, with a worryingly high churn rate.

Total revenue increased by $17.6 million to $346.3 million, an increase of 5.4% compared to the same period last year, but profit was down 16.7% from $51.3 million to $42.6 million.

Most analysts had pegged the company to produce a flat result at the worst.

Operating costs increased by 14.6% to $261.9 million.

Kiwi consumers have taken to high definition television with such gusto that Sky Television claims it is so far ahead of its sales programme it’s running out of product.

Chief executive John Fellet says the company had projected to sell around 40,000 units of its MySky HDi high definition satellite TV receivers by the end of last year.

Freeview says it finished 2008 with 52,522 of its HD receivers in Kiwi living rooms, a nose ahead of Sky Television’s installed base of MySky HDi boxes – which chief executive John Fellet says are a money loser.

At the end of 2008, a total of 198,938 Freeview receivers had been sold, meaning the consortium is now broadcasting to about 12.6% of New Zealand homes.

But although Sky TV still has nearly four times the market penetration overall, Freeview has moved ahead in the high definition race.

The first Freeview HD personal video recorder (PVR) will be launched December 11, going head-to-head with Sky TV's MySky HDi.

The model released December 11 is made by Zinwell, but other manufacturers, including A-lister Panasonic, are planning PVRs customised for Freeview HD and the platform's new MyFreeview service, that allows one-click recording of programmes through a user-friendly onscreen electronic programming guide (EPG) similar to the one offered by MySky.