True to pre-launch speculation, BSkyB has entered broadband with a price-cutting bang that will have sent tremors round the rest of the industry.
Vodafone's performance in its core European markets is continuing to worsen in both absolute terms and in relation to its competitors, and its margin progression is weak
There is little evidence of a revenue meltdown
The FAPL has just auctioned six packages of televised live Premier League (PL) rights, each comprising 23 games, for the three years commencing autumn 2008. The total consideration of £1,714 million is 67% up on the £1,024 million BSkyB is now paying over three years for the same number of live PL games
Barça cannot afford to dispense with Sogecable’s support as a pay-TV partner and possessor of contracts with the other leading clubs. A deal has to be struck
H3G’s 2005 results underperformed in 3 key areas: net subscriber additions were lower than promised, unit SACs were higher than promised and the group failed to reach EBITDA breakeven as promised
2006 promises to be much worse due to a markedly bigger drop of about 11.5% in weighted share of commercial impacts in 2005, due to a number of factors (not just multichannel platform growth), and an anticipated decline of between 2% and 5% in total TV NAR in 2006. Taking a mid-value of -3.5% yields a drop in ITV plc NAR of around £180 million in 2006
Vodafone’s discussions with Softbank to exit Japan could remove its most troubled and ill-fitting subsidiary, but only if the structure allows for a clean break, which will require tricky financial engineering given Softbank’s limited ability to pay
We estimate that savings for the typical French contract customer would actually be around 5%, and therefore not worth the extra handset cost and inconvenience involved
H3G’s new UK prepay tariff ‘WePay’, launched this week, offers the appealing gimmick of paying customers to receive phone calls. Less appealing is the 32% outbound calling price rise accompanying this change, and the estimated net impact of a 10-20% price rise.
However, we do not share NTL management’s optimism concerning the power of the ‘quadruple play’ – to date triple play has proved attractive to less than one third of cable households
Vodafone announced last week a new extension to its range of music services that will offer European subscribers interactive mobile radio through a collaboration with Sony NetServices
More prominent profile of media in Free's mix of broadband, telephony and IPTV to improve customer retention and attract content owners to Free's broadband distribution channel, while VoIP remains the principal driver for non-access revenues