Customer movement between operators shows susceptibility to dynamism in branding; O2 are picking up the majority of EE churners as customers move to the new “cool brand” while EE pull in Vodafone churners tempted by the new “best network”. O2 have the lowest churn though the lion’s share move to Vodafone and H3G churners are more evenly picked up by the other three

Customer perceptions of own operator network quality are high among the big 3 with no less than 75% of customers reporting theirs is the best network. O2 is the best regarded while H3G is the least best regarded highlighting a stark contrast between the (prospective) merging parties

Consumers report little interest in quad play and indeed operators in the both fixed and mobile markets have publicly confirmed the same from other market research. However the arrival of converged players in the form of a merged BT/EE or Vodafone re-entering the fixed space will see operators seeking to change this

Vodafone’s European revenue growth has dropped again in the latest quarter, both relative to the prior quarter and its competitors, with Spain performing particularly poorly

Ofcom is proposing taking back and re-auctioning over 30% of Vodafone and O2’s 2G spectrum as part of more general plans for ‘refarming’ 2G spectrum to allow its use for 3G services

Rising audiences for Cuatro in a booming TV advertising market have unexpectedly lifted Sogecable earnings in H1 2007, encouraging confidence that Cuatro will achieve breakeven in 2008, if not in 2007

Vodafone’s European operations revenue growth dropped, but not as much as various regulatory interventions would have warranted, implying a strong operational performance

Vodafone achieved its 2006/07 full year targets on revenue and profitability, with solid revenue growth (underlying about 2% in Europe) but dropping margins (by around 2pps in Europe)

Growth in Q1 2007 for the aggregate non-Vodafone European mobile operations was 4.2%, a slight decline from 4.7% last quarter (Vodafone reports its results next week)

The new consumer data tariffs from Vodafone and Orange in the UK continue the trend towards dramatically lower data prices for high end users, although they are cunningly structured to involve more moderate increases for low end users

With 84,000 net pay-TV additions in 2006, Sogecable resumed subscriber growth, but we expect this pace to decline in 2007 unless Sogecable re-positions on basic and expands distribution from satellite to cable and DSL

Vodafone and Orange are planning to share their 3G networks in the UK, and are looking at potentially sharing their 2G networks in due course