According to François Godard, a media and telecoms analyst at Enders Analysis who covers the development of football media rights agreements and subscription trends across Europe, the gap in broadcasting revenue is likely to persist and may widen further. Broadcasters, he explains, are drawn to competitiveness and a league’s perceived value, creating a structural virtuous cycle over time. 

“As the Premier League is becoming more attractive, they get more money. They buy the best players, which then increases the attraction for broadcasters. Furthermore, they buy players from other European countries, which attract their viewers. This again raises the value of the rights,” he says.

Tom Harrington, head of television at Enders Analysis, said there was "no way that Max could have successfully launched here without a deal with Sky", and that the agreement means HBO Max will be in more than 10 million households from launch.

"All the big continuing shows (House of the Dragon, Last of Us, White Lotus) will continue to be on Sky, so Max would be relying completely on new shows, especially Harry Potter, to grow a business from scratch," he said.

"On the content side, it's worth noting that HBO's hit rate is quite phenomenal - they don't release a lot but always have a few current shows with considerable cultural cut-through."

And with RTL Group’s acquisition of Sky Deutschland on track to receive regulatory approval this year, ProSieben’s new owners MFE-MediaForEurope are seeking partnerships that can bring scale to the German broadcaster’s offering – though that scale may be limited by the slow customer growth of MagentaTV, argues François Godard, Media and Telecoms Analyst at Enders Analysis.

“This was overdue,” comments Godard. “The new MFE management is rightly moving to make the ProSieben content available on more platforms and MagentaTV is an obvious place to start as it poses no strategic threat. However, note that Magenta has low penetration with only 4.7 million subscribers (barely about 11 percent of German homes) and is growing very slowly, with only 135,000 subscribers added in the past four quarters.”

The U.K.-based subscription research company Enders Analysis looked at whether or not news publishers should share their content on Apple News (and get a cut of revenue) or focus on growing their own direct subscription businesses – and found it’s a mixed bag, A Media Operator reported.

The line loss numbers from Openreach were “very encouraging” in spite of “aggressive promotions from alt nets,” said Karen Egan, head of telecoms at Enders Analysis. “There has been a lot of shorting of BT in light of the alt net pressure but they seem to be doing very well in the face of that and their all-important free cash flow recovery story remains very much in tact.”

Jamie MacEwan, senior media analyst at Enders Analysis, said that agencies were facing “sentiment volatility that will be tough for ad agencies to shake”.

He added: “Like it or not, their customers continue to spend big on Google and Meta. This leaves agencies increasingly dependent on a handful of platforms where they are outspent by SMEs and exposed to AI tools. That doesn't mean there isn't a lot for agencies to offer their clients in a complex media world, but clearly real-terms growth on a sector level will continue to be a struggle. That is why even Publicis' years of outperformance have not been significantly rewarded.”

According to Enders Analysis, Disney+ engagement in the UK has begun to improve after over 18 months of decline, with the gap to Netflix narrowing for the first time, albeit modestly.

The alternative networks — or altnets — have been badly hit by rising interest rates, amassing an aggregate £9 billion in debt, according to the latest figures compiled by Enders Analysis.

Karen Egan at Enders Analysis says: “She definitely did benefit from a timing perspective, coming in after Jansen left.

“But to her credit she told the story much better than he managed to.”

“In this business, they say: sports sell subscriptions, entertainment prevents cancellations,” says François Godard. He is an analyst for the sports rights market and advises companies like DAZN and Sky, as well as the German Football League (DFL). Pay TV without sports rights is difficult, he says. In an industry where everything is now available on demand, a product that still consists primarily of live events is very valuable. Events that no one wants to miss. Sports are the perfect bait for subscribers.