This week it sold its Newbury HQ and will lease back part of the campus. But as Karen Egan, head of mobile at Enders Analysis, points out: 'Vodafone is a bit of a tanker – it will take some time to turn around.'

Egan says: 'Other operators like Orange and 02 seem hungrier.'

She added that anyone backing Vodafone should be ready for another share price reverse, if the new CEO makes a debut statement, 'kitchen-sinking' all the company's shortcomings. But she is more sanguine about the dividend, saying: 'It may seem to some the sort of dividend that could be cut. But in my view it is sustainable as the big calls on Vodafone's cash are past.'

“The justification for the transaction was paper thin but it had the merit of forming a long-term financial umbrella over publications that are vulnerable,” said Claire Enders, founder of Enders Analysis and a longtime Murdoch watcher.

“Protecting the future of titles of great sentimental and political value might have been a motivation shared by few of those involved. Rupert Murdoch did not have convincing arguments for value add. Breaking up the News Corp stable is likely to release more value for shareholders in due course. We are always sympathetic to protecting plurality but it isn’t an argument the stock market has any time for.”

Jamie MacEwan, senior media analyst at Enders, explained that TikTok execs’ use of heating (which is boosting videos into users’ “For You” pages to achieve a more ideal number of views), confirms the TikTok team’s awareness of some of the drawbacks of having a very aggressive personalization engine — its lauded special algorithm — and so this is a way for them to account for those drawbacks in some way.

But media analyst at Enders Analysis Jamie MacEwan said Everyman’s success is more than just high-value films being released.

"Everyman was well-placed to capitalise on the consumer desire for louder and bigger experiences post-pandemic." he said. 

Head of research at Enders Analysis Alice Enders described Spotify’s job cuts as ‘inevitable’ for a company that relies so heavily on advertising. 

‘In terms of the number of programmes it produces, the number of subscribers it has, the number of awards it gets, Netflix is very much the first cab on the rank,’ Harrington says. Bajaria’s role is to keep it there.  

“Publishers must be prepared to lose editorial control on TikTok, even more than on other platforms,” commented Jamie MacEwan, senior media analyst at Enders. “You can’t guarantee your video will be widely shared on the day it’s uploaded.”

Karen Egan from research group Enders Analysis said e&’s public support for Read’s approach before his departure ‘probably prompted Cevian to pull out’. 

But she added that while the activist investors ‘may have given up hope’, other investors would be ‘campaigning hard for a fresh approach’ to recoup the losses in the share price.

‘The board will be under considerable pressure from all shareholders , many of whom will have lost a quarter of their money on Vodafone shares in the past year alone, to appoint a new boss with a more radical vision,’ Egan said.