Apple has now launched downloads of 28 US TV series in the UK, hoping to drive demand for portable video watching on iPod or for home viewing via Apple TV

Apple reported strong revenue growth for Q3 2006/07, up 23.8% year on year to $5.41 billion, powered mainly by strong computer sales

Apple has at least revolutionised two aspects of the mobile business: getting customers to queue overnight for a handset, and selling ‘contracts-in-a-box’, neither of which are likely to catch on in Europe

iPod revenue (quarterly, year-on-year) declined for the first time. Even though unit sales were up 24% year-on-year, the average iPod price was down 20%. Apple group revenue growth is increasingly dependent on Mac sales and new product launches, like Apple TV (March 2007) and the iPhone (in June 2007)

Canal+ targeted subscription (as opposed to subscriber) growth of 1.3 million by 2010 has a lot of stretch in view of the intense competition from free-to-air (FTA) services and in particular digital terrestrial TV

iPod volumes hit a record 21.1 million units sold in the key Christmas quarter, but year-over-year quarterly revenue growth declined again to 18% (from 29%) due to lower prices for all iPods and consumers’ drift to low priced flash memory based players (iPod Shuffle). Apple’s push on the iPhone limits the iPod’s future development and hence this segment’s future revenue growth

Apple has introduced its long-awaited iPhone, with sleek looks and a host of innovative touches, to be launched in the US exclusively with Cingular in June and Europe by the end of 2007

Ten years of fierce and implacable rivalry between Canal+ Group and TPS, the two French pay-TV operators, is expected to end in November 2006, when they close their merger deal and Canal+ France emerges. This report examines the strategic rationale for pay-TV consolidation in the French TV market, where digital terrestrial TV has recently launched and where TV-over-DSL is rapidly being deployed, as well as the potential for the currently low pay-TV margins to rise

Vivendi Q1 2006 quarterly results show solid underlying improvement in earnings, but disappointing subscription figures, which fell by 40,000 in the quarter 

We regard meeting even this extended deadline as difficult given their slowing growth, churn problems and the increasing network costs associated with their network outsourcing deals, and furthermore EBITDA is unlikely to improve significantly from 2007 onwards 

Happy Birthday iTunes! It is just over a year since Apple launched iTunes and the media continues to talk up the second coming of the music industry, whose saviour appears in the form of affable Steve Jobs. iTunes sold a total of 70 million tracks online in its first year, well below its target of 100 million, but a respectable showing, especially since it spawned a small flock of competitors determined to out-sell iTunes.