It was time for XM to begin clarifying the situation -- after 2-3 years of Sirius misstating their "leadership", I'm glad XM's management got the idea that it DOES hurt the company when consumers perceive your competitor to be "bigger", "stronger" or "better". Duh.

But between that and Mel's takeover nearly being complete, I fear the damage has been done.

Is XM recognizing or receiving revenue from their "Parking Lot Subs"? What is your definition of a "sub"?

xm receives no revenue from the "parking lot subs"
Sirius receives revenue from the OEM immediately after install as they are activated, so that they count as a sub due to revenue receipt

turn it around.. if Sirius removed the 11% of the parkinglot subs they would have about 7.3 million subscribers.

But once again.... the miss information begins...

XM soes not have "parkinglot subs.. rather promotional subs and they do receive revenue on them. All be it at a discounted rate

sirius receives revenu and as such should count to subscriber as well this also becomes a discounted rate as most Auto manufactures have about a 90 day inventory on hand or on the way. add that 3 months on to the 1 year subscription and the 1 month grace period and how long is it till a Sirius OEM sub "churns" out?.

This all skews the total sub count and Net and Churn numbers between the two companys so far out of whack that you CAN NOT COMPARE these metrics.

Now going the opposite way.. XM's newest method done with Hyundai skews things in a different direction by bumping up SAC and reducing churn as the Hyundai OEM churn never is registerd.

It also means that as of right now there ARE more listeners than XM claims.
While Sirius has less listeners cause many are unsold cars.

>>> xm receives no revenue from the "parking lot subs"
Sirius receives revenue from the OEM immediately after install as they are activated, so that they count as a sub due to revenue receipt

1. XM doesn't have parking lot subs.

2. Sirius receives a prepayment but it is not revenue until after teh eventual buyer of the vehicle purchases the car, which might be 4-5 months during which the car is counted as a subscriber but isn't generating revenue.

The Churn would be twice as high too. Its to XM's advantage to count the subs like they do

i miss my free XM on AOL radio

"Its to XM's advantage to count the subs like they do"
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If XM counted the 1,5M parking lot subs it would cut their ARPU by 10%

The number of subscribers is not a SEC or FASB metric or requirement, it
means NOTHING from a financial reporting reporting perspective.

Sirius counts the SUB but puts the $$$$ received from the OEM in deferred revenue.
XM gets nothing from GM until the car is sold.

Totally MUTE issue !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!1

"Totally MUTE issue !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!1" did you mean "moot". Nice to get financial analysis from a retard.

Totally MUTE issue !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!1" did you mean "moot". Nice to get financial analysis from a retard.
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So I misspelled , big frigging deal dikhead !!!! that eqates to me being a retard ?

I think that makes you the retard.

I think there would be that many already if the merger wasn't announced last year, but that's neither here nor there... water under the bridge now I'm afraid... truth is that's a m.. wait a second, did someone just moon me.. check the windows there... I think someone just flashed their butt cheeks at me...

You are also forgetting that SIRI pays the dealer/manufacturer for the sub (XM does too), then the dealer pays Sirius back. So technically It shouldn't be counted unless it is actual revenue when the car is sold and it is a self-paying subscriber.

As Stackpointer pointed (no pun intended) out a while ago in another post, from a accounting standpoint, it shouldn't be counted until is actual, and not deferred, revenue. There's a difference.

Also it should be noted that XM's OEM's from this point will grow substantially in the next three years (Hyundai, Nissan, Toyota), while SIRI has considerably less OEM growth after '08 since most of their automotive partners have ramped up this year.

On a side note, SIRI may only beat XM in total sub numbers in the 3rd or 4th quarter of this year. After that, XM will again pull away in '09 and beyond due to having almost 30% more OEM marketshare growth. The question remains: can they keep SAC down to handle the growth?

>>>>On a side note, SIRI may only beat XM in total sub numbers in the 3rd or 4th quarter of this year. After that, XM will again pull away in '09 and beyond due to having almost 30% more OEM marketshare growth.

This may happen, but we'll never know it -- because of the merger. (how convenient;)

Maybe Content IS King after all.

HOO HOO Robin. I only cut the lead by less than 1 million subscribers. Im worth the 750 million dollars these dumbass's are paying us.

"You are also forgetting that SIRI pays the dealer/manufacturer for the sub (XM does too), then the dealer pays Sirius back. So technically It shouldn't be counted unless it is actual revenue when the car is sold and it is a self-paying subscriber."

Dollars and cents aside. People who buy Sirius enabled cars arent choosing the service. It is given to them for "free".

Who gives a shit about this age old arguement ?.... better to spend your energy debating why we have 4200 dead and spent 1.4 trillion on idiot Bush's lies IMHO. People are dying man.... screw where the subs came from in the scheme of things I'm thinking.

Here's another one..... If Kevin Martin added two inches to his dick, he'd have a three incher. But who cares how long Martin's dick is, sans Addlestein.

I think XM is counting these now, not to show that it is better than Sirius, but so that Sirius can automatically incoorperate XMs numbers into the new combined companies earnings report with little difficulty.

I, too, think that Sirius should not count these numbers. It makes it impossible to compare.

I can agree, Sirius does NOT deactivate units. My boss bought a Chrysler vehicle used over a year ago. It had XM built in and I showed him how to use it. He has never paid anything and over a year later his used car still has Sirius pumping out.

Also I have a Sirius unit my brother gave me after he decided he didn't like the service. Its over a year old and while he paid for 6 months and it is nonrecurring, the unit is still live. Gotta love these nonpaying subs that Sirius continues to run so they don't take the hit on churn and sub numbers.

Mute issue! BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH!!!!!!!

That was no typo...you actually thought you were using the correct word in the right context!!!!!! Holy Jesus Palomino!

Must be a Stern fan.

Wow, when will the assbags come out crying about Howard fans being the first to post off topic, oh, you cant, see above "hoo hoo" post. Why do you always posyt about Howard, you must really like the show.

" "Totally MUTE issue !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!1" did you mean "moot". Nice to get financial analysis from a retard. "

hilarious.

"So I misspelled , big frigging deal dikhead !!!! that eqates to me being a retard ?

I think that makes you the retard."

As pointed out, it was not a misspelled word. This does make you a retard, and your analysis of the issue is thereby moot. Also, your comeback of "I think that makes you the retard" is very well thought out. It stung....bad. I'm not a chicken, you're a turkey!

hoo hoo robin every empty car is listening to me.i invented plush leather listeners.hoohoo tell em fred
ron and fez noon to three
plush leather liteners

"hoo hoo robin every empty car is listening to me"

and yet with all those empty cars arbitron still showed him beating everyone by 100x the audience. HOO freaking HOO

Ron And Fez now on Zero Point Zero

^Prepare for more spin spin spin from both of the pests.

Without looking at the specifics of each OEM deal that XM and Sirius has done ( and each one is somewhat different) it's hard to say if these "parking lot subs" should be included or not with the other subscribers. Are these deals available to review anywhere? For example, GM's initial deal with XM I believe also involved some special stock compensation to GM and the receiver was heavily subsidized by XM. As things evolved, XM's OEM deals were far less generous.

So to really analyze this, we have to look at the terms of each deal, the timing and form of the payments and also have a breakdown of the numbers of vehicles manufactured by each OEM in the reporting periods. I’m not sure these details are available from either company.

>>> So to really analyze this, we have to look at the terms of each deal, the timing and form of the payments and also have a breakdown of the numbers of vehicles manufactured by each OEM in the reporting periods. I’m not sure these details are available from either company.

It isn't that complicated.

Sirius counts OEM subscribers as OEM equipped cars roll off the assembly line, even though it will be 4-6 months before that car is sold to the eventual buyer. The OEM prepays Sirius for a year of service, but Sirius is not allowed to include ANY of that money in revenue (pursuant to GAAP) until the eventual buyer takes possession of the car. Thus, for that 4-6 month period before the car is sold, Sirius is counting the unsold vehicle as a "subscriber" even though FASB has determined (correctly) that it would inappropriate to recognize the revenue because the earnings process is not complete.

XM doesn't do this, and in fact, takes the other extreme for many of its OEMs, i.e., does not include the subscriber as a sub while they are in the promo period, until such time as they take affirmative action to subscribe.

Sirius has stated this treatment "overstates" their subscriber total by about 11%, or nearly 1,000,000 subscribers. XM has stated that if they used SIRI's method of counting subscribers, it would increase their total by about 1,500,000 subscribers.

I think we have reached a point where the disclosures are fairly adequate on this; in the past, Sirius hid this fact, but more recently, the question gets asked frequently enough that people pretty much know about it. And they do now detail it in the 10Q, whereas, they didn't until an astute Jonathan Jacoby outed them.

To clear up some misconceptions about car subs:
Both Sirius and XM count subscribers that they have received a payment for. This group includes GM, Honda, Chrysler, Ford, VW/Audi, and Mercedes, etc. Some OEM's such as Chrysler and Ford pay the subscription at manufacture. Some such as GM and Honda pay when the car is sold.
Neither company counts Toyota promotional subscribers. XM does not count Nissan, and Hyundai. Sirius will not count Kia. Neither company counts Subaru. The numbers are what they are. You will see the impact of how subscribers are counted in the ARPU metric. This is why you will see a differing ARPU between the two companies. I have written about the subject on Sirius Buzz many times.