After a post-pandemic investment boom that funded the high cost of installing fibre lines, the sector is now struggling with higher interest rates and more than £8bn of net debt, according to Enders Analysis estimates.
“Fintechs are blurring the lines between banking, payments, and connectivity,” said James Barford, head of telecoms research at Enders Analysis. “They already control the digital interface with consumers — moving into mobile services is a natural extension of that ecosystem.”
In a recent note, Enders Analysis said it was “perverse” for ministers to pursue a tax that would have a chilling effect on investment while simultaneously encouraging and even subsidising network build.
Karen Egan, from Enders, said the Government’s approach to the telecoms sector “seems quite muddled”.
She added: “It is little wonder that the quality of all sorts of networks in the UK are behind where they should be given a more than 50pc tax on investment in them, on top of highly restrictive planning laws, which also add considerable expense and delays.
“The Government promised that their reform of the business rates system would better incentivise investment, yet they seem to be going down a route which will penalise the high-priority digital infrastructure sector that requires billions of investment a year to upgrade the UK’s networks.”
Sources said the streamer has enjoyed some success in Spain, where it has a deal with Telefónica’s Movistar Plus+. François Godard, a media and telecoms analyst at Enders, said SkyShowtime is heavily reliant on these distribution deals in a crowded market. “It’s like the fifth brand of Coca-Cola in the supermarket. It may be good, but you have to notice it to try it,” Godard argued.
He added that industry consolidation will lead to uncertainty for SkyShowtime. Paramount has merged with Skydance since SkyShowtime launched, and David Ellison’s studio is now tabling bids for Warner Bros. Discovery, which has a significant rival to SkyShowtime in HBO Max. Comcast, meanwhile, recently sold Sky Deutschland to RTL, meaning there is “so much in the air” in terms of Sky’s presence in Europe, said Godard. “It’s difficult to think of SkyShowtime not being impacted by M&A in the future,” he added.
The sector — which boomed in the post-pandemic years when dozens of companies were set up to challenge the traditional operators — has struggled due to the large costs of laying fibre optic lines, in addition to higher interest rates. Enders Analysis estimates the sector has more than £8bn of net debt.
Karen Egan, head of telecoms at Enders Analysis, said although broadband challengers had “scaled back on their expansion plans, their operating losses remain firmly negative and interest costs are ramping up”. She added: “Their funding needs expanded by almost £3bn during 2024 on a revenue base of less than £500mn.”
According to research firm Enders Analysis, the Prosieben takeover is turning MFE into Europe’s biggest free-to-air broadcasting operator, with revenues of €6.8 billion ($7.92 billion). As well as its German business, ProSiebenSat.1 also operates in Austria and Switzerland, while MFE runs TV operations in Italy and Spain.
Karen Egan, at Enders Analysis, says: “The additional network choice is not worthwhile from a policy perspective in my view and it also makes it considerably more likely that that alt-net will never make any money.”
“When the private sector has been funding a sector, but starts to retreat as the economics are not stacking up as originally hoped, it doesn’t seem like good use of taxpayer’s money to prop it up,” says Egan.
“We are supposedly a free market economy, after all – and if the markets are telling you that there isn’t space for three separate fibre networks in an area then it’s probably quite right about that.”
François Godard, a senior media analyst for Enders, a media research and analysis company, told The Athletic in February that the $90million figure was “so low, it can only go up really substantially.” Godard even predicted it could double.
Soon after the protracted takeover process ended, Enders Analysis’ François Godard issued a note that said MFE “finds itself in a stronger position to talk to streamers about content deals in the follow-up of this summer’s announcements. In sum, the merger… is a welcome jolt to the European television industry.”
Looking further into the future, Godard’s colleague, Tom Harrington, says: “The real power lies with who controls how people watch, pay and interact with content.” Here, we’re talking about a bunch of unknowns: What role AI search and Google might play, the possibility of ‘super aggregator’ apps, and newer technologies that we can’t yet even envisage. This is where we’re headed, many believe.
