Dixons Carphone (DC) has announced the closure of all of its standalone Carphone Warehouse stores, distributing solely through its Currys PC World stores and online going forward.
Several industry trends have led to these difficulties and DC is pivoting its strategy to better position itself for the new reality.
This move is likely to be a positive one for the mobile operators, especially H3G.
2020 promises a year of transition for the games industry: eSports and games broadcasting are competing with traditional programming; game streaming services are becoming meaningful platform competition; and new consoles are on the way.
While most in the studio and TV industries continue to struggle with the games market—neither understanding (or seeing) a strategic fit, nor showing a willingness to invest—expect explosive growth to power the industry for the next decade and transform all entertainment services, not just games.
The ‘free-to-play’ games sector requires oversight and regulation to protect children and the vulnerable; expect regulatory turbulence in the UK, Europe and China.
Recruiting 29 million subscribers in twelve weeks, Disney+ has stormed the US market. Furthermore, the two million gain achieved after the holidays and the completion of The Mandalorian, relatively high ARPU, and rising Hulu and ESPN+ subscriptions bode well.
Conversely, booming (but expected) losses of direct-to-consumer platforms—due to increase as Disney+ launches in Europe in March—are undermining group profitability.
But, with a total of 64 million direct subscribers Disney can now claim a size and momentum that puts it in the league of the pure digital platforms—crucially backing its stock market narrative.
Despite operating in a challenging market, Sky has continued to increase revenues, with the resilient performance of its direct-to-consumer and content businesses offsetting the disappointing drop in advertising income.
Across FY 2019, EBITDA was up 12.2%; profit growth driven by a significant reduction in “other” costs as large one-off effects disappear and cost-cutting continues.
Extended distribution deals with Netflix and WarnerMedia will protect Sky’s content proposition for the coming future, as would the mooted integration of Disney+.
Comcast’s new, on-demand service, launching in April, is an attempt to break NBCU’s unsustainable dependence on sales to Netflix and other SVODs. Peacock provides a path of digital transition for advertising-funded TV with a revamped low-load, high cost-per-thousand model.
Reach will be built with a free online tier and distribution to Comcast subscribers. Peacock seeks carriage from other pay-TV operators, with which reciprocal deals would make sense (i.e. HBO Max on Comcast alongside Peacock on AT&T’s platforms).
In Europe, where Comcast has no existing major free-TV offering to transition, launching Peacock will be challenging but could present Sky with ideas to counterweigh Netflix on its own service.
In this report we show the findings of our 2012 UK mobile user survey. The report is a wide ranging analysis of the mobile market based on our consumer research, focusing on the competitive landscape among the mobile operators and smartphone manufacturers, and the changing consumer behaviour that has and will continue to impact the market
CPW’s key operating metrics worsened again in the March quarter, with connection volume growth dropping to -19% and like-for-like revenue growth dropping to -5.5%
Weakness in the UK prepay market continued to affect CPW’s results, with volumes again down 30-40%, but contract sales did not mitigate this as much as last quarter, with growth in the UK but declines in continental Europe
Prepay is not likely to improve until the end of 2012, as the volume decline annualises out and more smartphones are available at prepay price points, and contract recovery is dependent on economic recovery
Enders Analysis co-hosted its annual conference, in conjunction with BNP Paribas and Deloitte, in London on 19 January 2012. The event featured talks by 13 of the most influential figures in media and telecoms, and was chaired by Sir Peter Bazalgette. An edited transcript of notes taken during the speaker presentations follows.
The speakers were Sir Martin Sorrell (CEO, WPP), Glen Moreno (Chairman, Pearson), Martin Morgan (CEO, DMGT), David Levin (CEO, UBM), Dan Cobley (MD, Google UK & Ireland), Mike Pocock (CEO, Yell), Vittorio Colao (CEO, Vodafone), Charles Dunstone (Chairman, Carphone Warehouse, TalkTalk Group), Stephen Carter (President, Alcatel-Lucent EMEA), the Rt. Hon. Jeremy Hunt MP (Secretary of State for Culture, Olympics, Media and Sport), Neil Berkett (CEO, Virgin Media), Liv Garfield (CEO, Openreach) and Ed Richards (CEO, Ofcom).
Carphone Warehouse’s Q3 2011/12 volume and revenue was severely hit by a steep reduction in UK prepay volumes, with prepay subsidy cuts driving a drop in the UK market of as much as 40%
However, stronger volumes of higher margin contract handsets drove a small improvement in gross profit for the quarter
The unexpected prepay weakness means that Carphone Warehouse’s handset business will have roughly flat operating profit in its 2011/12 financial year at best, although given the negative external factors this would reflect a strong underlying performance
CPW’s European handset business had a steady quarter, with growth dipping slightly on the previous quarter but still in line with full year guidance. Smartphone sales are surging, and CPW is orientating its business towards them, but their impact is not unambiguously positive in Europe
The US handset business continued to enjoy strong growth, with this side of their business benefitting strongly from smartphone growth, and this outperformance led the company to increase its full year EBIT guidance
The UK ‘big box’ roll-out is continuing, but no sales figures or indications have been given, and the full year operating loss guidance has been increased, eating up some (but not all) of the outperformance from the US. There appears to still be much experimentation involved at this stage, and even more uncertainty about the eventual success or failure of this new business