XM’s Loss Widens

XM said its net loss widened to $144 million, from $14 million in discussing is 4th quarter financial results with analysts this week. It posted a full year net loss of $284.4 million, compared with $51.9 million last year.
Costs increased in Q4 for content and programming, customer service and billing, network, sales and marketing. XM president/CEO Hugh Panero said he expects sales to begin slowly this quarter, and gradually spike by the holiday selling season of this year.
XM expects to have 70,000 customers by the end of this quarter and 350,000 by the end of the year. Its receiver partners expect to have a combined capacity to produce 50,000 units by April.
Only 5% of XM’s customers are choosing monthly billing; most elect to pay quarterly, said Panero.