Gareth Sutcliffe, analyst at Enders Analysis, said that such a deal would be “really clunky” for consumers but “might be a way around the CMA”. “Microsoft will be running the numbers for a UK carve-out that will please the CMA,” he said. “They would be looking at least-worst options.”
Author of the Enders research, Claire Holubowsky, told The Addition "Public expectations of and interest in women's coverage are growing faster than ever before, and the space is primed for innovation and out-of-the-box thinking. Women's sport offers so much in terms of reach, advertising, and brand-building that there are myriad ways for news publishers to move and strategise - what matters is that they act (and soon!) to make the most of the opportunity provided by the Women's World Cup."
François Godard, an analyst at Enders Analysis, says: “German news is notoriously centrist, consensual and a little bit boring, so one could think there is an opportunity to be seized.”
He added “Reichelt may be the right man for this. He has a somewhat Trumpian profile – starting with his reported sex life. He also proved keen on populist news coverage.”
Claire Enders, a media analyst, said that there was likely to have been an “unfortunate misfit between the current expectations on valuation of the sellers and this buyer”.
“What we had was a kangaroo court, which destroyed someone who did not commit a crime,” said Claire Enders, a London-based media analyst. “The BBC got drawn into the feeding frenzy. It got drawn into a trap set by The Sun.”
“The BBC is always in the crosshairs of party factions that have spent decades campaigning against its existence,” says Claire Enders, an independent media analyst.
Joseph Teasdale, head of tech at the research firm Enders Analysis, said some pro-competitive interventions by regulators, such as curtailing its ability to make its search engine the default, could threaten Google’s position in search.
“Google controls various surfaces—things like Chrome, Android, Google Assistant—and in the past the ability to make Google the default or only search engine on those surfaces helped maintain its dominance. This tying of Google search to other Google surfaces has been a focus for regulators,” he said.
But Teasdale said he doesn’t believe these interventions ultimately would have much of an effect on its search market share. “At this point Google search is genuinely preferred by users,” he said.
However, the fact that Google already faces intense antitrust scrutiny could make it harder for the company to strike back when competitors try to encroach on its territory.
But Prosieben CEO Bert Habets has talked down the possibilities of a merger, stating that the company needs to be “in control of our own destiny.” And according to François Godard, Senior Media and Telecoms Analyst at Enders Analysis: “The pieces of the puzzle are not together to launch a takeover.” This could spell bad news for Prosieben shareholders, “who would love to see an auction for their stock,” especially with the aforementioned cut to their annual dividend.
There are several reasons why a takeover is off the table. Aside from the regulatory intervention that has prevented European mergers over the past year, MFE has neither the resources nor unified management to pursue the acquisition, though further collaboration with ProSieben is a more likely outcome. “MFE always said that they wanted to create some sort of cooperation with the Germans without necessarily buying them,” says Godard.
Gareth Sutcliffe, senior games analyst at Enders Analysis, told IGN any divestiture “is likely to be face-saving as opposed to impactful”, adding: "Long-term access contracts are a better solution and have been accepted elsewhere.
"The question is really how would a divestiture benefit the UK market or consumer, especially if it’s related to cloud gaming? The CMA should pivot towards a long-term commitment from Activision and Microsoft to stay and invest more systemically in the UK games industry. No other regulator has requested or achieved that."
