XM HITS 4 MILLION SUBSCRIBERS Chuck Taylor and Katy Bachman – Mediaweek Subscriptions to XM Satellite Radio have passed 4 million, the company announced Monday, and its latest million were added in less than five months. The company said it is on target to sign up 5.5 million subscribers by year's end. Its long-term goal is to convert some 20 million by 2010.
More than 70 percent of all satellite radio subscribers have XM. Sirius, which lags behind XM by a wide margin, recently announced it had reached 1.5 million subscribers and expects to sign 2.7 million by the end of the year.
XM claims that it has acquired 4 million subscribers in less time than it has taken that number to adopt cable TV, CD players, MP3 players, cell phones, personal computers, local radio, broadcast TV, satellite TV or digital video recorders. It took XM 23 months to sign its first 1 million subscribers and eight more months to reach 2 million. Six months later, the satcaster hit the 3-million mark. |