Alice said the deal was unsurprising in the context of the current market: “The first, and perhaps most obvious point, is that we are now another regional publisher fewer in the UK. Consolidation is always to be expected in a declining industry.”
She added “Like any merger, it is likely the new owners will seek to reduce costs and overheads, though Rcapital will have likely realised many back-office rationalisations.”
Alice told City A.M. that it was “unsurprisingly disappointing for the many other advertising-reliant digital native media companies watching."
She explained how there was an inherent danger for companies like BuzzFeed in shifting from the “media” label to the “tech” one. Pickthall said it was always going to struggle to live up to investor expectations.
Tom said “The public perception has been that these services are cheap. And they certainly were. But the cost is now quickly transitioning from what is for many an automatic and then forgotten regular discretionary spend, to a noticeable chunk leaving their account.”
He added “The streaming market has been supported by debt-funded, loss-leading, loss-making models. Netflix entered the market and set a budget price and everyone has had to come in under that to compete. You had all these profitable content companies, pay-TV and linear-TV broadcasters who had to move into streaming, and it is not as profitable. Now they have to start looking at value, and customers are going to be continually asked to pay more until these things make real money.”
Jamie said "Telegram's profile has grown enormously in recent weeks, and that has raised the stakes about the impact of misinformation on the platform."
He added "Meta employs tens of thousands of moderators and huge problems still slip through the net," said MacEwan. "It is unclear how much investment in moderation Telegram can support on its current funding model."
Niamh framed the move as a “scaling back” of the bill, changing the focus from making these platforms “safe spaces” to trying to weed out particular content deemed harmful. Burns has sympathy for the government’s efforts, but warned that it was a game of “playing catch up."
Karen said mobile operators have realised that their ability to make returns in this sector is hinged on scale. ‘Scale’ players, like Virgin Media O2 and EE, make returns, but ‘sub-scalers’, like Vodafone and Three, struggle to”, she told City A.M.
“The idea is that consolidating from four networks to three might lead to lower prices rather than higher ones as customers are only having to fund three networks across the country rather than four."
In turn, this would allow all of the operators to make a return without driving up prices for customers – and customers would still continue to have considerable choice.
Tom praised Amazon’s move in what he called an “extremely competitive” market.
“Differentiation within your library is now an overriding necessity, and what makes some content distinctive, and therefore valuable, is global brand recognition."
He added “Intellectual property like James Bond, Rocky and The Handmaid’s tale provide both long-term library value and the possibility of spin offs with a guaranteed audience. This is why Amazon’s acquisition of MGM might be worth its weight in subscriptions."
Abi said Some of these efforts are produced in house. Future’s proprietary tech stack enables the company “to drive almost instant revenue growth."
Jamie said “This is another example of Telegram being linked to resistance movements. It has very much been part of its reputation over the past couple of years as it has boomed. It is associated with being a safe haven.”
He added “The timing of the emergence of talk of an IPO is quite telling, coming almost immediately after the early 2021 boom when its user potential started to explode. I think the momentum they now have, the sheer weight of users, and the fact they are experimenting with ‘privacy safe’ advertising make them an attractive flotation candidate.”
Alice said “The reality is that it is beneficial for people to set up a charity with top heavy management structures, even if by doing so is not directly helping to address the problem it is trying to solve in society."
She added “The Charity Commission is more reactive than it is proactive. The Commission isn’t investigating issues, but waits for them to be flagged when there is a specific complaint.”