The BBC plans to launch four new digital music stations as extensions of Radio 1, Radio 2 and Radio 3 and enhance 5 Sports Extra, all subject to regulatory approval.

Commercial radio is flourishing due to continuous innovation, while in stark contrast the BBC has experienced large audience losses, especially among the young.

The BBC should be able to launch new services— subject to competition assessments—while Ofcom should consider the impact of the total station regardless of whether delivery is broadcast or online.

TikTok has been dealt a devastating blow as a US bill has been signed into law forcing owner ByteDance to sell within a year or face its removal from app stores. 

The stakes are higher than in 2020—China's opposition to a divestment will make an optimal sale harder to conclude, so all sides must be prepared for a ban.   

The TikTok bill introduces extraordinary new powers in the context of the US and China's broad systemic rivalry, though online consumer benefits will be limited.  

As viewing moves online, broadcasters’ on-demand players make up a growing proportion of viewing, becoming central to their future strategies.

However, even though SVOD viewing might have begun to plateau, BVOD growth cannot yet balance the decline of linear broadcast.

Of this shrinking pie, 2023 saw most of the major broadcast players increase their viewing shares.

Germany’s RTL+ streaming platform has been revamped into an 'all-in-one' bundle of content including premium sports, music and audiobooks.

RTL wants to leverage its FTA reach to build an online subscription base large enough to influence the future shape of German TV.

To sustain subscriber growth we argue that RTL will need to release defining content and explore partnerships beyond its current deals with telcos.

Meta's China risk is overstated: the spend from Chinese advertisers is diverse and resilient to everything short of a full-blown trade war. 

Apple (and Tesla) are in the more precarious position of selling directly in-market, and face sharpening domestic competition.

Amazon's exit from selling in China still leaves it exposed: its marketplace strategy is built on Chinese sellers, whose potential routes to market are proliferating with local platforms going global.  

Radio listening is strong, but with a dramatic decline among the under-24s. Smart speakers will accelerate the trend and while the draft Media Bill’s intervention is helpful, it is not the cure.

The commercial sector is thriving through the launch of digital-only stations and major players taking advantage of deregulation. The issue of attracting a new generation is pressing.                                       

The once-dominant BBC has a loyal older following. Hampered by regulation, it is difficult to see how younger audiences will develop an affinity with its audio offering.

A cooler consumer market sees Sky now facing the same pressures as its SVOD competitors, with a loss of pay-TV subscribers in the UK.

However, Sky is performing better in telecoms in both the UK and Italy. These markets are less susceptible to recession with Sky also benefitting from its position as more of a challenger than an incumbent.

Uncertainty continues to loom over both the sale of its German platform and the upcoming allocation of Serie A rights in Italy.

Despite its scale, YouTube can get overlooked. But its tremendous reach and impact across all demographics make it the internet's universal service provider. 

YouTube is still the golden child for creators who want to make a living from their content. For YouTube, this broad base of suppliers ensures a position of strength from which to claim a large revenue share. 

Competition from TikTok took some of the shine off YouTube's usage, and forced it promote lower-monetising Shorts. YouTube is pushing heavily into subscriptions, TV sets, and premium content via sports rights to boost the money it makes per minute spent. 

In a reform of the competition regime for digital markets, by 2025 the UK will have conduct regimes for platforms including Google, Meta and Apple, overseen by the Digital Markets Unit.

Nested within could be a ‘fair bargaining’ regime for platforms and news groups, following Australia and Canada, whose lessons could be valuable to preserve platforms’ incentives to serve news. In Canada, platforms are refusing to pay to serve news links to their users, and plan to exit this form of content.

Financial transfers to UK news groups by platforms is among the new UK regime’s aims, but is unlikely to make up for the declining revenue trend of local news provision whose sustainability is most at risk.