Canal+ is entering a critical phase of growth following the recent merger with its former rival Télévision Par Satellite (TPS). Vivendi has set short term guidance targets for 2010 of 11.5 million subscriptions, turnover above €5 billion and more than doubling of EBITA from €490 million to over €1 billion. This presentation examines these targets and concludes that Canal+ will fall short of all them. In the best case baseline scenario of least competition from other pay-TV and free-to-air (FTA) services, it projects EBITA in 2010 of just €890 million
VMed’s Q1 results represent a further step in the recovery of the core cable business, with markedly lower churn and strong growth in operating cash flow (OCF)
Growth in ARPU is reinforcing the impact of improving cable subscriber growth, but revenue remains in decline, year-on-year
Microsoft’s $44.6 billion offer for Yahoo! represents the software giant’s last opportunity to compete with Google in the rapidly growing market for online advertising, which is forecast to double to $80 billion within three years
Yell announced this week that full year sales growth (to March 2008) in its UK operations would be 2%, sharply down from the previously forecast 3%, due to “toughening market conditions” since the start of 2008
O2 this week announced changes to its contract tariffs; however, these will have limited impact for most of their subscribers, and the reductions to their data pricing only bring them into line with changes the other operators have already made
Rumours that Google was acquiring Yell emerged at the end of last week, but we doubt the search giant would be interested in purchasing a traditional media company, particularly not one predominantly in print