Online advertising outperformed other media in 2003 in the three biggest European markets of the UK, Germany and France, a trend which we expect to continue in 2004-06. Paid search has been the principal driver of growth in the UK market (up 70% in 2003), but interest of advertisers has cooled as steep price rises have reduced its cost effectiveness as a customer acquisition tool. Paid search is taking off in France and Germany, and will fuel growth in 2004-06.

UK broadband take-up continued to be strong in H1 2004, with an estimated 1.1 million new home and business broadband subscribers expanding the base to 4.2 million. Take-up is being aided by aggressive price competition - many ISPs are now offering broadband packages below the critical price point of £20/month - and relentless marketing campaigns as the 'land grab' for subscribers continues.

The structure of the UK broadcasting industry will be hugely influenced by the timing of the analogue switch-off. It will particularly affect ITV, whose licence fee is set by reference to the percentage of the population able to receive digital signals.

The unveiling of new handheld gamers at E3, the games industry's annual gathering in Los Angeles, has resuscitated interest in the fast maturing market for handheld gamers. Sony's PlayStation Portable (PSP), Nintendo's dual-screen GameBoy and Nokia's redesigned N-Gage QD are major product plays for companies that must each prove themselves again to be innovative or continue to decline.

Although 3G mobile networks are being rolled out aggressively in Japan, instead of the promised land of increased voice and data revenue driving higher profits, revenue is stagnant and costs are rising. In this report we examine why and consider the lessons to be learned for European operators.

UK digital TV (DTV) growth is rocketing ahead, but how fast? Ofcom and BARB – the two ‘official’ sources – agree that growth has been faster since Q4 2003 and that Freeview is the main reason, but are issuing increasingly divergent estimates. Ofcom is, in our view, overestimating Freeview and BSkyB homes. We prefer BARB's methods and rely on its estimate of 48.1% of UK TV homes (11.7 million DTV homes).

The take-off of local loop unbundling in H2 2003 enabled France to record the highest rate of broadband market growth in 2003 in Europe. This torrid pace of growth continued in Q1 2004 due to retail price declines and 50% rises in ISP ad budgets year-on-year. Free, Neuf, Cegetel, Telecom Italia, Tiscali are offering LLU-based DSL offers, bundled in most cases with telephony.

This report examines the medium-term prospects for Cable & Wireless. In 2003, analysts sensed a new dawn for C&W following the arrival of new management and the company's exit from the US.

In this report we update our regular survey of UK mobile users, with the latest survey conducted in April 2004. We look at user penetration, handset replacement rates, camera phone ownership and use, and also the market share prospects and camera phone usage for the mobile network operators.

Happy Birthday iTunes! It is just over a year since Apple launched iTunes and the media continues to talk up the second coming of the music industry, whose saviour appears in the form of affable Steve Jobs. iTunes sold a total of 70 million tracks online in its first year, well below its target of 100 million, but a respectable showing, especially since it spawned a small flock of competitors determined to out-sell iTunes.