Recent developments in AI have ignited a frenzy in the tech world and wider society. Though some predictions are closer to sci-fi, this new phase is a real advance.

We view AI as a ‘supercharger’, boosting productivity of workers. The impact is already being felt across media sectors, including advertising and publishing.

Firms thinking about using AI should assess which tasks can be augmented and what data is required. Be prepared for unpredictable outputs and a changing legal and tech landscape.

Prime Video is a vital, freestanding component of Amazon’s sticky and fast-growing Prime subscription bundle—but it is also the key cog in the company’s overall video marketplace strategy

With the Prime subscriber base and Fire TV operating system driving scale, Prime Video and the ad-supported Freevee guarantee traffic, foster competition and maintain quality—ensuring leverage to deal with suppliers

However, the entertainment platform market is fiercely competitive and video is different from socks: content can’t be commoditised, meaning that Amazon must allow third-party brand building

The total value of European football media rights has stagnated since the end of the last decade, translating into a real terms decline.

New entrants like DAZN and Amazon have occupied the space left open by incumbents such as Sky and Canal+.

Serie A, Ligue 1 and the Premier League will tender rights this year, entertaining unrealistic expectations of bids from Apple.

Broadcaster decline accelerated in 2022, with record drops in reach and time spent. This was primarily driven by the lightest and youngest viewers leaving broadcast television while over-65s also reduced their viewing for the first time.

Loss of lighter viewers threatens the future viewing base of broadcasters and relevance to a new generation. Further, broadcaster status as the home of mass audiences becomes compromised.

However, retention of lighter viewers is not yet a lost cause. They are amongst the heaviest Netflix viewers, and the very lightest are spending more time in front of the TV set than previously—suggesting enduring appetite for TV-like content.

Microsoft and Google are both incorporating AI-powered chatbots into their core search offering. This will create a better user experience for some search categories earlier in the customer journey.

Search is a huge prize, bigger than TV advertising, and AI represents the biggest potential shakeup to that market since the rise of mobile. With ~95% market share outside China, Google's risk is to the downside.

Search is an early, but not the most natural, home for conversational AI: Microsoft and Google have also announced integrations into productivity software. Expect a wide range of services to be transformed by AI integrations as startups and tech giants alike seek share in newly contestable markets.

Although pandemic restrictions are now a distant memory, the aftereffects linger in the retail sector despite the recovery of in-person retail since H2 2021.

Between pre-pandemic 2019 and post-pandemic 2022, volumes are down for fuel and stores selling food, clothing and household goods, exacerbated by inflation, which is also reducing real disposable incomes.

Online sales settled to 26.5% of retail sales in 2022 (excluding fuels), up from 19.2% in 2019. Online volumes remain well above 2019 levels, and long-term prospects are bright with higher road fuel costs and hybrid work-from-home.

A combination of factors drove the worst quarter ever for big tech growth, though the secular shift online of the economy and society will continue.

Advertising demand is down, reflected in lower prices. Ads did better the closer they are to transactions, with variability by category.

Efficiencies and AI are the investor-soothing buzzwords going into 2023.

Structural shifts in the delivery of video are causing long-form viewing to coalesce around fewer programmes—this comes despite an explosion in the volume, spend and perceptual accessibility of content

For the time being this theoretically favours the largest of shows, along with the declining number of content providers that are able to create and distribute them at scale, forming critical masses of interest

Incoming technologies leveraging AI and virtual production will have the ability to drastically lower production costs. But until that happens the spend on most programming will become increasingly less efficient

In a transformative upgrade of its content subscription offering, Google is buying the rights to live Sunday NFL games for $2 billion per year for 2023-2031.

YouTube can leverage its massive reach to challenge existing video aggregators, including pay-TV platforms and Amazon, as a gatekeeper to consumers.

Google will likely deploy a similar strategy in Europe, eventually competing with Sky, Canal+ and other incumbents—a hopeful development for football leagues.

A strong UK labour market, with record low unemployment but historically high vacancies, has supported growth in the recruitment industry, though trends may be peaking as we reach unknown territory. These trends play out in the recruitment market before they become apparent in the labour market

Despite the fragmentation of the online recruitment listings marketplace, Indeed is well-placed to dominate this space due to its increased scale and aggressive investment strategy

Both Google and Facebook have announced their intention to move into the recruitment listings sphere, which may have consequences not only for classified expenditure but further up the value chain with the agency model. However, both giants have attempted to move into online classifieds before, with little demonstrable success