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Claire Enders was quoted in an article on the future of ITV, as speculation grows over changes at the top of UK broadcaster. Claire said “this is a watershed year for ITV. This is the year that people realise that peak TV is behind us and while ITV has many different levers of revenue advertising will be tough. Adam has done a great job but the fact is ITV is in play because of the fall in the company’s share price and the value of sterling.”
21st Century Fox and Sky plan to notify their proposed merger to the European Commission, perhaps by March, and obtain clearance on competition grounds, as rapidly as in 2010.
The merger could also face, along the lines of 2010, a separate regulatory process in the UK on media plurality grounds, by a decision of Secretary of State Karen Bradley.
If the UK process happens, Ofcom will provide its advice on the merger’s impact on news and current affairs, whose consumption has shifted massively online since 2010.
UK mobile service revenue growth improved in Q3 to -0.8% from -1.7% in the previous quarter, a welcome turnaround after three quarters of declining growth. Pricing remains firm, data volume growth remains robust, and some of the one-off factors affecting the previous quarter have dropped out
Sky Mobile soft-launched at the end of 2016, and it is taking an aggressive approach with a very deep MVNO technical model with substantial fixed costs, a high advertising budget and ambitious internal subscriber targets. To date the fixed MVNOs have not had a substantial impact on the MNOs, targeting a customer base that is non-core, but with SIM-only on the rise this may change
Looking at recently released network performance statistics, the impact of spectrum disparities is clear, with EE both able to offer faster speeds nationwide due to its large blocks of 4G spectrum, and offer much faster speeds in London. EE also has a lead in geographic coverage, and is planning to push its coverage much further, creating a challenge for the other operators to keep up
European mobile service revenue growth recovered to nearly reach positive growth in Q3, improving a whole percentage point over the previous quarter to -0.2%
The main driver of the improvement was continued ‘more for more’ price increases combined with a lack of price wars at the lower end, although the current detente does not feel very stable. Furthermore, the pressure on growth from the general trend towards SIM-only and the consequent lower contract revenue looks unlikely to alter
Revenue growth of around zero as almost achieved this quarter is sufficient for the operators to grow the bottom line, but not to transform their network coverage in the style envisaged by 5G enthusiasts – more substantial growth is needed to cover the costs of such a step-change
James Barford was quoted in The Times on UK broadband speeds following Ofcom's "Connected Nations 2016" report. James said "If you look at comparable countries such as France, Germany, Italy and Spain, we are doing extremely well. We have the fastest broadband speeds, the widest availability of superfast speeds and among the lowest prices", but added more could be done.
UK residential communications market revenue growth accelerated to 5.8% in Q3, from 5.0% in the previous quarter, helped by an overlapping price rise at BT, and supported by firm pricing and accelerating high speed adoption elsewhere
In contrast, volume growth in the core three products continues to slow, with little sign that this will ever re-accelerate. In the longer term we cannot see ARPU growth acceleration continuing to fully compensate, and market revenue growth might also have peaked
With Virgin Media’s continuing network extension and improving pay TV service putting pressure on the other operators, Sky and TalkTalk are protecting themselves by aggressively marketing high speed broadband. Correspondingly, this quarter marks the first time that Openreach’s high speed net adds were mostly derived outside of BT’s retail divisions
TalkTalk’s broadband subscriber decline has re-accelerated, with retail weaker than wholesale, and its consumer revenue is declining at 6%. This is partly due to price change timings, partly due to last year’s cyber-attack, but also partly due to underlying weak retail broadband subscriber growth
EBITDA did grow strongly, although this was in part due to less subscriber growth. The new pricing plans will likely drive more short term revenue weakness, but could potentially drive lower churn in the medium term, and they have renewed TalkTalk’s price competitiveness, particularly on high speed products
Longer term, we still think that the company will find it challenging to stabilise its retail broadband base in the face of a slowing market and Virgin Media’s network extension, at least without significantly upping its marketing spend and sacrificing some margin
Francois Godard was quoted in an article on Vincent Bolloré’s intent on creating a southern European powerhouse in media and content, and Vivendi's Mediaset stakebuilding is another step towards that goal. Bolloré’s move on Italian broadcaster Mediaset has all the hallmarks of tactics honed over four decades of dealmaking: aggressiveness, audacity and creeping control. Francois said “it’s typical Bolloré. It’s very bold, it’s not a straightforward bid to buy a company and he’s obviously betting on dissent among the Berlusconi family.”
Brexit has not noticeably depressed advertising spend in 2016, as consumer spend is buoyant, fueled by borrowing and lower savings. Yet, businesses are being cautious as uncertainty weighs on the future rules of trade with the EU
We forecast total advertising spend to rise by 0.6% at constant prices in 2017, almost entirely due to digital growth, which is expanding the total advertising market. Its share has soared from 1% in 2000 and looks likely to hit 50% in 2017
Up to now digital growth has always been at the expense of print and not television, but this could just be changing as mobile increasingly holds centre stage for the consumer