TV viewing has one reliable, long term trend: programme genres are watched by consumers at predictable life stages and ages

At a high level, there has been little manipulation of the balance of genres being broadcast. But amongst the sub-genres, editorial optimisation has resulted in an uptick in actual viewing

As the core viewing age of linear television rises, there is an opportunity for broadcasters to leverage this to create the most desirable schedule for their available audience by daypart; with genres that transcend demographics when younger viewers tune in

• The Commission proposes to require VOD services to implement a 20% share of EU works in catalogues, which Netflix already largely meets
• More impactful is the EU’s proposal for OTT SVOD services to provide access to the home service when subscribers travel in the EU, benefitting the UK’s 14 million subscribers
• TV broadcasters, which observe a 50% EU works threshold in their linear programming served on TV platforms and online players, will be able to opt-in to portability

Short form video is growing. It is easy to create, share and, with the rise of mobile technology, incorporate within communication

But despite the novel flexibility that mobile technology offers, the actual video most desired is surprisingly traditional

Buzzy, short form content fills gaps that have always existed; yet, despite the hype, it will remain supplementary to long-form programming

A post-Brexit recession will cause a hyper-cyclical decline in the advertising revenues of broadcasters and publishers

The Vote Leave idea of the UK joining a free trade area for goods with the EU would sever UK access to the Single Market for services, damaging the export-reliant audiovisual group, among many other sectors of strength

Made-in-the-UK IT, software and computer consultancy services will lose eligibility for government procurement tenders once the UK is an outsider to the EU

2015 has been a very good year, with revenues up 13%, helped by buoyant market conditions, in which TV spot advertising revenues increased by 7%. EBITDA also increased by £8 million in spite of an extra £25 million spent on programming

2015 saw UKTV overtake Sky to become the non-PSB channel group with the highest advertising Share of Commercial Impact (SOCI) delivery among adults 16+, while Q1 figures suggest the gap will widen in 2016

The horizon beyond 2016 is less clear as further revenue growth will rely much more on organic factors, in which respect UKTV’s online offering UKTV Play has much promising potential, if it can be realised

Enders Analysis co-hosted its annual conference in conjunction with Deloitte, Moelis & Company, Linklaters and LionTree, in London on 8 March 2016. The event featured talks from 22 of the most influential figures in media and telecoms, and was chaired by Sir Peter Bazalgette.

This report provides edited transcripts of the talks, and you will find accompanying slides for some of the presentations here.

Videos of the presentations are available on the conference website.

European mobile service revenue growth was flat at -0.8%, while underlying country movements were somewhat more dramatic. The key highlights were Italy returning to positive growth driven by pricing stability, and France showing worsening growth decline for the first time in over two years impacted by challenger telco pricing cuts

An assessment of these challenger telcos highlights a somewhat precarious position, as continued price aggression yields diminishing incremental gains, and they all remain some way from gaining the scale to achieve profitability

The only incentive for challengers to remain aggressive is as an encouragement for their competitors to buy them; increasing regulatory hurdles to consolidation would remove even this incentive, leaving price increases as their only rational route to profitability

Record growth in 2015 shows Netflix to be well on its way to achieving its goal of 60-90 million US streaming customers, while the latest wave of international expansion suggests Netflix will at least double its global base to over 150 million streaming customers by 2020

Much has been said about the growing SVOD competition from Amazon, Hulu, HBO, Disney and many others, but the simplicity and single-mindedness of the Netflix model is hard to beat, with evidence suggesting it has extended its lead in the toughest of markets, the US

Although growing spend on content origination is putting a strain on the Netflix business, it is critical to long-term success, contributing to the distinctiveness of the Netflix offer and its complementariness with other SVOD services

Netflix gained 1.8 million accounts in the course of 2015 (+37%) to 5.2 million, surpassing the 1.3 million VOD-enabled homes added by fixed line telcos Sky (including NowTV), Virgin Media, BT and TalkTalk. SVOD homes overlap with pay-TV accounts, and are topping up content for family members, not cord-cutting

Amazon Prime Instant Video, bundled into Prime, looks set to balloon from 1.6 million users in Q4 2015 on the back of the marketing of Jeremy Clarkson's motoring show, cementing its position in home entertainment by serving a family-friendly eco-system of devices and media, leveraging its mammoth 25% share of UK e-commerce

Free-to-the-user YouTube remains the heavyweight with 35 million monthly unique users in the UK, although skewing strongly to Millennials, while those 55+ will take longer to move beyond catch-up TV to embrace a wider range of VOD options

UK mobile service revenue growth dipped down in Q4, but at least remained still just positive at 0.3%. The dip was driven by contract ARPU weakness at the largest three operators, mitigated by strong ARPU growth at the smallest operator H3G

Looking forward, the sources of weakness (growth of SIM-only and tariff policy adjustments) look more temporary than the sources of growth (data volume growth filling up capacity). SIM-only is likely to hit a natural ceiling, whereas data volume growth has no ceiling in sight and the scope for network capacity expansion is limited

With CK Hutchison currently negotiating with the European Commission in regards to the fate of the H3G and O2 merger, there is a high level of uncertainty on the future of the structure of the UK mobile market. Merging the two networks would generate extra capacity and capability, likely increasing competitive intensity, but the precise form this would take is unclear, as is the future of the brands and the identity of the capacity MVNO recipient(s)