Preliminary numbers from US trade body DEG: The Digital Entertainment Group’s 2014 Home Entertainment Report reveal home entertainment digital spending continued to rise in 2014; electronic sales and subscription on-demand were up in both the final quarter and full year, and that the total home media business is keeping pace with box office value.

The home entertainment sector saw good results for 2014 with the consumer spend in key digital categories growing at a double digit pace. Consumers embraced the convenience and accessibility of purchasing and collecting digital content, while studios reaped higher margins from these digital sales. In particular, theatrical new releases delivered exceptional annual growth of more than 60 per cent.

Among the highlights for 2014:

• Overall electronic sell-through (EST) spending rose 24 per cent in the fourth quarter versus the same period last year, with overall EST for 2014 up 30 per cent over 2013 to more than $1.5 billion. Year-over-year growth spending on EST for theatrical new releases soared more than 60 per cent in 2014 versus 2013.
• Subscription VoD (SVoD) was up 25 per cent in the fourth quarter of 2014 versus 2013 and up the same amount year-over-year.
• Total US home entertainment spending topped nearly $18 billion for the year.
• The total home entertainment spending was keeping pace with the box office value versus video release.
• UltraViolet accounts grew by more than 30 per cent in 2014, with the total number currently at more than 21 million with 110 million movie and television shows in their UltraViolet libraries – nearly doubling the number of rights.(Source: DECE).
• HDTV penetration is now at more than 95 million households. All Blu-ray playback devices (including set-tops and game consoles) are at 70 million US households.
• Among the year’s top titles are Frozen (Walt Disney Studios), Hunger Games: Catching Fire (Lionsgate), The Lego Movie (Warner Bros. Home Entertainment), Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug (Warner Bros. Home Entertainment), Guardians of the Galaxy (Walt Disney Studios), Gravity (Warner Bros. Home Entertainment), Thor: The Dark World (Walt Disney Studios), Lone Survivor (Universal Pictures Home Entertainment), Captain America: The Winter Soldier (Walt Disney Studios) and Maleficent (Walt Disney Studios), How to Train Your Dragon (DreamWorks Animation/Twentieth Century Fox Home Entertainment), Transformers 4: Age of Extinction (Paramount Home Media Distribution) and X-Men: Days of Future Past (Twentieth Century Fox Home Entertainment).

Final numbers will be available in late January.

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