NBCUniversal cable networks boost Comcast’s bottom line

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Cable giant Comcast Corp. got a rude welcome into the broadcast television world.

In its first financial filing since closing on its deal to take a majority ownership stake in NBCUniversal, Comcast reported strong results from its new cable networks including USA and Bravo, but the broadcast network NBC had a tough first quarter.

Overall, Comcast posted net income of $943 million for the three months ended March 31. That’s a 9% gain compared to the same quarter a year ago. Revenue at the cable and programming behemoth rose almost 32% to $12.1 billion.

At NBCUniversal, revenue fell 11.5% to $4.3 billion. The broadcast network NBC saw its revenue drop roughly 35% to $1.4 billion. Comcast said the lack of Olympic programming in the first three months of this year made for unfavorable comparisons to the first quarter of 2010. Comcast said if the Olympics were left out of the comparison, NBC’s revenue would be up 4.3%.

Universal Pictures, which had a few first quarter disappointments in ‘Paul,’ ‘The Dilemma’ and ‘The Adjustment Bureau,’ endured an 8% drop in revenue to $975 million.

On the bright side, the NBCUniversal cable networks had a strong quarter as revenue jumped 13.3% to $2 billion.

In its cable distribution unit, which includes its cable and high speed Internet businesses, Comcast’s revenue increased about 6% to $9.1 billion. The growth came even though Comcast’s number of cable subscribers fell from 23.5 million to 22.8 million.

-- Joe Flint