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.
The US is intent on preventing the CCP’s goal of AI supremacy by 2030, banning exports of advanced AI chips to Chinese companies. So far, these bans have largely been shrugged off to create a new commercial dynamic in the region.
Huawei wields a de facto monopoly on the manufacture and sale of advanced chips in China. Huawei also sells cloud services globally and threatens Apple's $70 billion in Chinese revenues through its premium handsets.
China’s AI regulation is highly supportive of the training and deployment of Chinese-language LLMs developed by tech platforms, startups, and device makers, with meaningful revenue gains only appearing by H2 2024.
Device makers regained their mojo at this year’s MWC, with phones a crucial route to generative AI becoming a daily habit.
AI software has improved and proliferated, but limited differentiation leaves room for consolidation as a competitive funding crunch looms.
Unanswered questions loom large, but won't dim AI's potential.
Sony PlayStation’s next CEO will have hard decisions to make: compete against a resurgent multiplatform Microsoft, or retreat and defend an increasingly rickety PlayStation console model.
New gaming hardware will have an outsize influence in the year ahead, giving gamers unprecedented choice, starting with XR headsets and continuing to a likely new Nintendo Switch.
YouTube’s foray into browser-based games will be the service to watch in 2024. If successful, streaming services, including Netflix, will be on track to become heavyweight game platforms.
Google has launched a dedicated ebooks store in the US, with support from 4,000 publishers, providing an ecommerce platform for independent book retailers
Google’s aim is not revenue from ebooks, though the market is attractive: we estimate ebooks will be 5% of the US books market in 2010 ($1bn) and could grow to perhaps half of all book sales within the next five years
Like Amazon and Apple, Google is using ebooks to support its broader strategy, driving search traffic and building an ecommerce platform. Revenue from ebooks is less important than supporting these objectives
Facebook Messaging adds email, IM and SMS to Facebook messages. Some portion of the social network’s 600+ million users will switch to Facebook for an all in one text-based communications service
Switchers to Facebook Messaging in the US will reduce the display ad revenues of traditional portals, like Yahoo! and Microsoft, which use such tools to drive traffic
Less affected is Google. Some Gmail users will switch, but Google’s core business model is selling search advertising, where it is not challenged by Facebook (yet)
European mobile revenue growth improved by 0.8ppts in Q3 to reach -0.3%, but all of this improvement and more was due to easing regulatory pressures, with underlying growth actually declining marginally
GDP growth continues to improve year-on-year, but in the current low confidence environment underlying mobile revenue growth is not (yet) responding. Smartphone sales are surging, but their net impact on revenue is hard to discern
Looking forward, the regulatory impact is likely to turn negative again for the next few quarters, so some underlying growth catch-up is required for revenue growth to stay at around zero
Microsoft’s new Windows Phone 7 operating system is launching with a big bang: ten handsets, eighteen operators, and a massive marketing campaign
The OS itself is positioned firmly in between iPhone and Android in terms of ease-of-use and customisability; it is as fast as the best-in-class but no faster; and its interface is bold but will not be to everybody’s taste
A lack of apps, limited distribution, and expensive handsets will likely limit sales in the short term. Longer term, being late in the game with no truly compelling unique feature will make building a major position very challenging, but not impossible
In Q3, Google’s UK revenue increased 14% YoY to £520 million – in line with our expectations of slowing growth in H2 – our forecast for 2010 remains at £2,075 million (all figures excluding estimated hedging gains)
In its earnings call, the company shared global display and mobile revenue numbers – on an annualised basis these now represent $2.5 billion and $1 billion respectively (with some overlap) – much higher than previous estimates
We have adjusted our 2010 forecast for UK internet advertising to account for higher than expected classified growth and previously unreported spend to £3,900 million
Google has confirmed the first content partners for the US version of Google TV – including Turner, HBO and Netflix – which is expected to launch within the next 2 weeks
No new distribution partners have been announced and rumoured pricing for enabled Sony TV sets suggests that Google TV will initially be a premium product
At present, Google TV’s main selling point appears to be providing a decent web surfing experience to the TV set – in our view, better content is needed if it is to compete with Apple TV and other internet TV devices