Until now, ITV has been “reticent” to premier shows online because “they make so much more money on terrestrial” TV, said Tom Harrington, head of television at Enders Analysis. But the company’s hand has been forced because “linear viewing is dropping so quickly."
For François Godard, senior analyst at Enders Analysis, the reason for this discrepancy is to be found in the platform's ambition to compete with players like Netflix. "Salto, it was a mistake from the start. Its shareholders are free channels for which the challenge is not to replicate Netflix. How to finance original content with a million subscribers and at very low subscription prices? down ?" Salto is losing money, generating around 50 to 60 million euros in revenue and 180 million in gross losses for its shareholders, according to Les Echos. "The only ones to do this in Europe are Canal+ and Sky. These players have a much greater economy of scale, offering sport and the services of other platforms as aggregators," he continues.
TV expert at research hub Enders Analysis Tom Harrington underplayed this hype around the digital launch.
“ITV is just accepting that it needs to get into the future,” he told City A.M., explaining ITV’s reluctance to evolve in recent years, especially compared to Channel 4 and the BBC.
Other observers worry about the potential impact of increased streaming viewership on ITV’s traditional core networks business. ”We are confident that (ITVX) will be a step change for ITV’s online engagement, however, we believe that ITV may be understating its potential cannibalization of linear,” Enders Analysis analysts Tom Harrington and Gill Hind argued in a Nov. 9 report.
“It has been refreshing to see ITV publicly talking down its current streaming service, the Hub, picking at the failings — its clunkiness, dated feel and lack of content — that have been obvious to consumers for years,” the Enders Analysis duo wrote. “That nothing was done about it sooner was clearly due to mitigation of linear cannibalization and the relative difficulty of monetizing online audiences. If ever there was a sign of a tipping point in the decline of linear, it is this: the least tech-minded broadcaster pushing hard into streaming.”
Head of Mobile at Enders Analysis Karen Egan was also unsurprised by Read’s departure, but told City A.M. that whoever replaces him must come from outside of the Vodafone bubble to bring a “fresh approach for a complete rethink."
Behind comes Salto, with more than 800,000 subscribers. The TF1, M6 and France Télévisions platform is aiming for the one million mark by the end of the year. “It's a positive figure, given the fact that Salto is not distributed by the main telecom operators and Canal (only on Bouygues Telecom and Amazon Channels, editor's note). But it's not big enough to have a sufficient scale and make original productions that would make the difference”, observes François Godard, at Enders Analysis.
Douglas said “There’s no doubt that the model is getting harder. I think the next year is going to be very difficult, as it will be for print advertising of all kinds. Undoubtedly some of these brands will retreat from print.”
He added “There’s a reason why these businesses continue to print: they see it as a unique proposition for advertisers and readers. Once you become an online-only business your proposition [isn’t] the same.”
McCabe, in a warning to other newspapers, said that the demise of the freesheets, although unlikely, would have an impact on the health of the broader print industry. “If there is a worst-case scenario that freesheets disappeared, it would be unhelpful for paid-for newspapers”, he said. “The news industry is an advertising category; softness in the free sheets makes the industry as a whole less appealing.”
Ultimately, it could be a matter of viewing the football club as an intellectual property asset more akin to Gucci, Louis Vuitton or Star Wars, said François Godard, who covers media for research group Enders Analysis.
“If you start looking at football clubs how you look at fashion brands and Hollywood franchises, then you’re on to something. From that point of view, there’s potential. You’d think Man United could be much bigger eventually.”
“Disney faces the risk of a long decline in its linear TV cash-cow at a time when the direct-to-consumer ventures are at peak losses, which is quite uncomfortable,” said Francois Godard, a media analyst at Enders Analysis. “But I struggle to imagine a different approach than the one currently implemented.”
