This year marked the second annual IABUK Digital Upfronts. As well as Facebook, Google/YouTube, Aol, Yahoo!, Twitter, BuzzFeed, Vice and others, several traditional media companies – Sky, The Guardian and Global Radio – participated, reflecting the rising importance of digital media and digital media buyers to their businesses

Many of the pitches were informed by the key shifts in online content: it is increasingly cross platform, driven by mobile devices and focused on video programming, and these formed the main themes of the event

A key piece of context is the rise of social media and the shift to programmatic buying, which continue to driven down pricing for all but the most valuable inventory – audience scale, high value audiences and premium content have never been more essential

At launch, Google’s new subscription service YouTube Red competes most directly with premium music streaming services, also offering ad-free videos

YouTube’s augmented revenue model re-boots incentives for native talent to produce content for the platform, and will also widen its appeal for established content producers

Although consumers are likely to find paid subscription for ad-free videos a weak proposition, Red holds much potential for YouTube as it competes for attention across device ecosystems, and presents little risk to its existing advertising model

Germany remains the second largest market in Europe for the exploitation of composition rights by their authors, with €382 million paid out to them in 2014, up 8% on 2013 (63% share of distributions on average). The German Government intends to secure an even “better balance for authors” in their contracts with music publishers, by allowing the composer to “re-tender” their contracts after five years to secure a better deal

GEMA, the collecting society, has a strong position in Germany and is poised to lead the development of the digital single market for online music services. Together with PRS for Music (UK) and STIM (Sweden), GEMA has formed a joint venture (JV) to offer multi-territory licensing and copyright administration services to services, music publishers and other CMOs, cleared by the EU Commission

Music publisher revenues from domestic collections could rise from €225 million to €247 million from 2014 to 2017, due to a moderate rise in broadcast revenues on the back of the economic recovery, a boost to public performance revenues from a higher live music tariff and flat royalties from recorded music expenditure, as the decline of physical mechanicals is offset by the rise of online royalties

Enders Analysis co-hosted its annual conference, in conjunction with BNP Paribas and Deloitte, in London on 17 March 2015. The event featured talks from 13 of the most influential figures in media and telecoms, and was chaired by Sir Peter Bazalgette. This report provides the accompanying slides for some of the presentations.

Videos of the presentations are available on the conference website.

Enders Analysis co-hosted its annual conference, in conjunction with BNP Paribas and Deloitte, in London on 17 March 2015. The event featured talks from 13 of the most influential figures in media and telecoms, and was chaired by Sir Peter Bazalgette. This report provides edited transcripts from some of the talks, and you will find accompanying slides for many of the presentations here.

Videos of the presentations are available on the conference website.

YouTube remains the dominant online video site globally, although competition for the viewer is growing from OTT video and other popular apps. Reach and consumption appear to be slowing in the US and the UK, but YouTube reports strong growth in global watch time as smartphone adoption proceeds

The number and variety of Multi-Channel Networks (MCNs) on YouTube continues to grow. Music video MCN Vevo has so far been the largest single presence on YouTube, but it is being overtaken by the combined Disney/Maker Studios MCN 

In contrast to the aggregator MCNs with tens of thousands of channels, studio MCNs have much smaller network sizes and a higher share of owned channels. Their focus on content curation and creation has allowed some to build global audiences of repeat viewers, a unique strength and of significant appeal for advertisers

In 2014 Canal+’s core premium French pay-TV business has continued to lose subscribers and swallowed a VAT increase. But this was offset by growth in FTA ad sales, in ARPU, in overseas subscriptions and by acquisitions. EBITDA has continued the decline which commenced in 2013

Eleven years ago Canal+ in France and Sky in Britain had the same household penetration, but since then a gap has opened up and now Canal+ lags behind at 21% compared to Sky’s 34%. The French platform suffers from its regulated focus on films and its neglect of hardware

A deep revision of Canal+’s model is needed, through building a library of scripted series and a revamp of the consumer proposition to differentiate on quality and user experience. Building on recent initiatives, mediocre IPTV services should be bypassed by OTT bundles on fibre, and the satellite offering upgraded

As we expected, Canal+ won the broadcast rights to the Ligue 1 top three weekly games in 2016-20 and beIN Sports have the seven remaining fixtures Sensibly, the two competitors avoided a bidding war but ended up paying 28% more than the 2012-16 agreement – the first substantial increase since 2005 The new contract will help Canal+ sustain pricing and marketing. Meanwhile, even if it completely lost the ongoing Champions’ League auction, Canal+’s football prominence would remain

The French Professional Football League (LFP) is to auction its 2016-20 broadcasting rights next month, one year earlier than expected. The anticipated auction (and short notice) increases pressure on rival LFP broadcasters – a failure to renew their existing rights deals would unsettle their position for over two years

Due to uncertainty over the future ownership of Canal+ and the political background of Al Jazeera’s beIN Sports we believe that both would prefer to maintain the status quo: the top two weekly games on Canal+ and the other eight on beIN Sports

The LFP rights are precisely packaged to prevent this, and to force the two to compete at least for one lot. As the market leader Canal+ has more to lose, while beIN Sports could sustain its current complementary positioning with fewer games