Thanks to substantial growth in revenues and further cost-cutting measures, German pay-TV platform Premiere has revised its predicted operating loss downwards a second time - to less than Euros 40m for 2003.

In February, the Premiere had originally forecast a loss of Euros 80m. This was then revised downwards to a maximum of loss of Euros 60m in April in the light of Premiere's ongoing recovery.

Premiere has seen its revenues climb to Euros 471m in the first half of 2003, up 26% over the same period in 2002, and the number of subscribers increase year-on-year by 12% to over 2.6m by the end of June.

At the end of July, this total had surpassed 2.7m which Premiere's CEO Georg Kofler describes as "another important marker [reached] quicker than planned."

Premiere now expects turnover to exceed Euros 900m for 2003 and for the break-even point to be attained in the first quarter of 2004.

Premiere has output deals with every Hollywood studio except Sony Filmed Entertainment, with which it is currently in negotions.