Sky Television hiked by an unexpected 19.1% interim net profit because of surge in subscribers for its MySky HDi service.

Chief Executive John Fellet attributed the growth to consumer interest in the MySky HDi service.

The new service reports a "significant reduction" in subscriber churn with a gross churn rate of 10.7% for MySky HDi, compared to a 14.4% rate for subscribers on the standard digital decoder.

The MySky had a surge of 6.1% in average revenue, while the advertising revenue fell 15%, due to recession, representing just 7.5% of the company's total revenue.

Sky confirmed that it will pay a dividend of 7.0 cents per share with a supplementary dividend of 1.2352 cents per share.

My Network Television Ltd., New Zealand's largest pay-television operator, reported a rise in profit as more of interactive MySky sales increased.

"Our existing subscribers, in spite of a recession, have continued to show interest in our current products as well as the new services such as MySky", Chief Executive Officer John Fellet said.

The MySky box acts as a digital recorder and offers access to high definition television, thus enabling the company to sell more of its movie and sports channels.