Homepage

Enders Analysis provides a subscription research service covering the media, entertainment, mobile and fixed telecommunications industries in Europe, with a special focus on new technologies and media.

Our research is independent and evidence-based, covering all sides of the market: consumers, leading companies, industry trends, forecasts and public policy & regulation. A complete list of our research can be found here.

 

Rigorous Fearless Independent

The Financial Times

11 October 2010

Reporting on the first set of results published by the mobile phone operator, Everything Everywhere, created from the merger of the Orange and T-Mobile businesses in the UK (Everything Everywhere - disappoints analysts), the FT reiterated the operator's ambition to establish a 3G network to cover 99.6 per cent of the UK population by 2014.

James Barford was asked for his view. He said that Everything Everywhere’s planned network would offer “far better coverage” than the existing 3G infrastructures belonging to O2 or Vodafone.

The Guardian

11 October 2010

In an article which questioned the future for print media devoted exclusively to women readers (Women's magazine sector is bullish about the future. Digital options grow but glossies are also confident about their survival in print), The Guardian concluded that women's magazines appear to be in surprisingly good shape.
Douglas McCabe was asked for his view. He said: "The female space is a lot more resilient than almost every other print media that we can think of... Print magazines simply suit the kind of content that is centre stage in those titles – fashion, beauty, great photography. While there is a lot of online content of that nature, it's a limited substitution. That doesn't mean the industry is without problems, although the upmarket titles are better placed than ones further down the pecking order."

Google has confirmed the first content partners for the US version of Google TV – including Turner, HBO and Netflix – which is expected to launch within the next 2 weeks

No new distribution partners have been announced and rumoured pricing for enabled Sony TV sets suggests that Google TV will initially be a premium product

At present, Google TV’s main selling point appears to be providing a decent web surfing experience to the TV set – in our view, better content is needed if it is to compete with Apple TV and other internet TV devices

Total UK media advertising will grow 3.7% to £15 billion in 2010, on a bounce back of TV, internet and national newspapers from the recession

If UK economic growth slows to a crawl, UK media advertising could decline by about 1.1% in 2011

For local and regional newspapers and magazines, ongoing structural pressures are dominating the recovery in 2010, and we expect the headwinds will be even stronger in 2011

 

Everything Everywhere’s maiden investor day presentation was soured by the disappointing results it reported for Q2 2010, with service revenue growth underperforming its UK competitors by 7 percentage points. At current relative growth rates, O2 will retake its lead by June 2011

The synergy savings targets have been maintained, but focused more towards back office functions and away from front line assets such as shops and network base station sites, with the brands being kept separate for the time being. This is a sensible enough approach, and the cost savings still look eminently achievable

Going forward, the company will have the advantage of a better network but the disadvantage of disruptive integration for the next few years. Its main challenge will be to reverse the current negative revenue momentum, which puts both its revenue and margin targets at risk

 

We forecast UK online advertising to grow by 8% CAGR to £5.1 billion by 2014, representing approx. 33% of total advertising spend, overtaking press

Search is the main growth engine, which we predict will reach £3.1 billion in 2014, due to its appeal and value to advertisers as a sales and lead generation tool

Growth in spend on social media and video networks will push online display to just over £1 billion by 2014; whilst classifieds will grow to £840 million

 

US recorded music sales continued to slide in H1 2010 (-9% year-on-year for physical and digital formats (excluding ringtones), on a track equivalent basis). The UK recorded music market has been stronger than the US in recent years, and H1 2010 was no exception (down -1.5%)

Music major revenue declines on recorded music are being partly offset by growing licensing fees paid by music streaming services, as well as artist and merchandising services under 360 degree contracts

High margin music publishing revenues remain the pillar of music major profitability. These declined in H1 2010 due to the delayed impact on current quarterly results of the advertising recession in 2008/09, and we expect the advertising bounceback to be reflected in future results

 

The Financial Times

28 September 2010

In an interview with Gavin Patterson, Chief Executive of BT Retail (Sleeping giant wakes up to technology), the Financial Times observed that BT Vision "has not tackled its rivals impressively since launching in 2006. With fewer than 500,000 subscribers, it missed its initial target of 2m-3m".  The article also revealed that BT's average revenues per broadband customer were declining in the company’s first quarter, due to discounting. Ian Watt was asked for his view.

The Financial Times

28 September 2010

In an article which revealed an upturn in UK regional newspaper property advertising (Johnston buoyed by property ads), the Financial Times quoted an optimistic Johnston Press which predicted that the "total advertising revenues [should] fall less than 3 per cent in the third quarter of 2010, compared with a nadir of 32.7 per cent declines in the depth of the recession last year".

Douglas McCabe was asked for his view. He said: “It’s hard to share Johnston’s optimism that job or property advertising are going to improve or even stay flat in the next year.”