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Enders Analysis’ Karen Egan told City A.M. that Niel’s swoop for Vodafone was undoubtedly driven by his firm’s failed bid to buy Vodafone’s Italian unit for more than €11bn (£9.6bn) in February.
She said this, combined with shareholder frustration, was a key driver for the businessman, who also has an expansive portfolio across Europe and Africa.
Douglas McCabe, CEO and director of publishing and tech at Enders Analysis, estimated the lost advertising could equate to around 15 million pounds ($17 million) a day for TV companies, 2 million pounds ($2.3 million) for radio, 2 million pounds for billboard owners, and 1 million pounds ($1.1 million) for newspapers.
Not all that money will completely disappear, McCabe said. There is likely to be pent-up demand from brands who want to return to advertising at an appropriate time. Many publishers and out-of-home media owners will have received ads from companies looking to pay tribute to the Queen, McCabe added.
He added "They could have sold three or four times more. Demand for newspapers was greater on Friday [September 9] than it has been for many decades, with retailers selling out early in the morning."
Francois said "Bertelsmann had great ambitions that are now completely turned upside down. What will happen now in the Netherlands? The Dutch and German regulators will look at the French case very closely."
A few months later, TIM underwent a change of management and “realised they had a very high debt,” explains François Godard, Senior Media and Telecoms Analyst at Enders Analysis. They renegotiated the DAZN deal, reduced their payments and relinquished exclusivity, meaning the sports streamer is again available on the Sky STB.
“The commercial conditions for consumers are not very generous,” notes Godard. DAZN is not bundled in a sports package for Sky customers – in fact DAZN subscribers wishing to watch on Sky’s satellite feed have to pay an extra €5 per month on top of their monthly fee. “If you want the satellite feed, because you want the better picture quality, you have to pay more."
James said “Emergency services network offers far higher data bandwidth and in theory it should be much cheaper, because you are using an existing network.”
He added “The problem with divestiture is it could take some time to do.” Another option is price controls, which “are in some ways more straightforward”, Barford says, but notes both are “very significant interventions."
Joseph said “TikTok is not really social. The chances are your friends aren’t good at making videos — you’re there to see the good stuff, and so in this regard Facebook has no advantage. TikTok is more like a personalised TV channel.”
Observers consider the course to be consistent. "Chapek has done everything right in business, you can't fault him for anything," says François Godard of British consulting firm Enders Analysis. Predecessor Iger bought valuable companies such as Lucasfilm, Pixar, Marvel and the entertainment division from Rupert Murdoch's empire, but spent a lot of money on them. The Murdoch deal alone cost $71 billion. "Chapek now has to show that he can consistently make money," said Godard. It is clear that this does not suit some fans. In public, however, the Disney boss was "treated quite unfairly."
Douglas said “The era of scale, volume, and traffic as the core business model for journalism has passed. About 2 million new digital subscriptions for journalism were created during the pandemic in the U.K. alone. As publishers focus down on distinctive content that people will pay for, they are also designing new bundles and clearer use-cases and benefits for people. Online rewards different provisions from general print media.”
Joseph said that although gaming had an “explosion” during the various lockdowns, there is still a huge amount of untapped growth ahead of it: PwC reckons the global gaming industry will be worth $321 billion by 2026.
He told City A.M. that the industry has become a lot more “device agnostic”, with intellectual property (IP) for franchises becoming the new prized asset.“The business model has shifted away from products and widgets, like your standard Xbox or Playstation, and more towards subscription models, where you can pay £50 and have access to a whole range of live service games and franchises."