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Douglas McCabe was quoted in an article on Time Inc, who wants to sell its UK magazines division, including well-known titles such as Country Life, TV Times and the NME, as part of a wider shake-up of the struggling US publishing group. The move is part of what the company called a “strategic transformation programme” and comes after Time abandoned plans to sell itself in April, ending months of speculation over the future of the group which owns Time, People and Sports Illustrated. On Friday Time reported a 17 per cent fall in second quarter print and other advertising revenues, and confirmed a $400m cost-savings programme. Time, formerly known as IPC, is one of the UK’s biggest magazine publishers. According to data from Enders Analysis the company’s titles attracted the highest annual circulation in the UK in 2016 with 168.7m. Douglas said that while the move by Time was not a shock, it was still a “big decision” for the US group. Adding that “the UK is a very important territory, probably the biggest outside the US. But print ads are tough, digital advertising hasn’t taken off and its market share is being threatened by bloggers and other social media online”.

Claire Enders was quoted in an article on the UK Culture Secretary, Karen Bradley, concerns over corporate governance failures at Rupert Murdoch's Fox, and lack of procedures of broadcast compliance for Fox News in the UK. Recent scandals at Fox News are threatening to derail Rupert Murdoch’s proposed £11.7bn takeover of European pay-TV group Sky after the UK government signalled that it was likely to widen an investigation by regulators into the deal. In a significant shift, the culture secretary said she was now likely to refer the bid to the Competition and Markets Authority on whether 21st Century Fox’s acquisition of Sky shares it does not own would comply with UK broadcasting standards. Her shift in position, which followed intensive campaigning from anti-Murdoch groups and a cross-party group of MPs, also overruled a recommendation from the UK media regulator Ofcom, prompting some analysts to question whether the move was politically motivated. Claire said “this was a political decision. It’s very peculiar to override Ofcom despite no change to their advice”.

Claire Enders was quoted in an article on the announcement by Karen Bradley, the UK culture secretary, on the Sky/Fox bid. Ms Bradley said that she was minded to widen a referral to regulators about the £11.7bn deal, to include scrutiny of corporate governance controls at Fox News. Ms Bradley raised new concerns about the transaction, overruling a recommendation from Ofcom, the media watchdog, that regulators consider only the deal’s impact on the UK media market. Claire said “Ofcom hasn’t changed its mind. “There is no new news, but the secretary of state has decided to go for the safest option to protect her from a judicial review. This shows the government just needs a quiet time”.

Douglas McCabe was quoted in an article on the Express, once the best-selling newspaper in the world, which could be heading for new ownership. On Friday, Trinity Mirror, publisher of the Daily and Sunday Mirror, as well as 150 local UK titles, said it was in exclusive talks to acquire the Express and Star newspapers, along with the magazine assets owned by Mr Desmond’s parent company, Northern and Shell. Although both sides stressed that a deal is still some way off, Trinity’s renewed interest — the two sides tried but failed to clinch a deal back in 2015 — presents Mr Desmond, 65, with the opportunity to bail out of the rapidly shrinking newspaper business. Throughout Mr Desmond’s time in charge, the Express group has posted healthy profits. But during his ownership, the daily newspaper has been eclipsed by rival the Daily Mail, with circulation falling from more than 1m at the time of Mr Desmond’s takeover in 2000, to just below 400,000 today. Douglas said “every publisher has had to make cuts over the past few years. But the Express group has been more ruthless than most”.

Matti Littunen was quoted in an article on the growing numbers of people using mobile devices to access social media or watch films and popular television boxed sets. Accordingly, Enders Analysis research published yesterday showed that for the first time more than half of the total number of minutes spent online by Britons is via mobile devices, with more than 36 million people spending an average of two hours accessing the internet on their phones or tablets every day. Matti said that bigger screens, the availability of faster and better connections and the rising popularity of streaming services such as Netflix and Amazon Prime were helping to drive higher levels of smartphone use. He added that the rising level of smartphone penetration was being driven further by “changing attitudes” towards banking, ecommerce and dealing with local government. Increasingly, this was encouraging people to perform everyday tasks online that previously they would have done manually. “It’s only logical that for people who don’t need a big screen, they will gradually shift towards mobile only”.