One year on from the launch of the latest generation of gaming consoles Microsoft and Sony remain locked in a high stakes struggle for dominance of the gaming industry, and longer term viability of the console category.

Sony’s PS4, which we estimate outsold Microsoft’s Xbox One 3:1 in Q3, looks certain to win this round in a return to form for Sony following the relative disappointment of the PS3. Microsoft, struggling from missteps early in the Xbox One cycle, may have left it too late to catch up.

The wider games market continues to shift to mobile and online gaming, as developers seek to exploit the vast installed base of connected devices. New console gaming experiences from Steam and Amazon may be the primary growth driver for controller-based gameplay.

2014 has been a good year for total advertising, which we forecast to grow by 5.5% across the year; display advertising spend is also forecast to grow by over 6% year-on-year. This is largely thanks to a positive economic backdrop, where we have seen a significant rise in consumer expenditure over the last two years

Online advertising spend has been the biggest recipient of growing ad spend, with 20+% growth last year, this year and next. This has mostly been to the detriment of print revenues, where online classified search solutions, amongst other factors like declining circulation, have disrupted print marketplaces

Video has been the largest growth area in internet advertising as online video consumption increases. Up to now online spend has largely been accretive to TV budgets but we are starting to see some advertisers switch to online video spend. However we do not expect TV to suffer in the same way as press

Recently we attended the inaugural IABUK Digital Upfronts, in which 11 digital media companies pitched their wares to advertising agencies and advertisers.

UK growth in internet advertising is now powered by mobile, social and video, and these three areas were the focus of the Upfronts.

The Upfronts are symbolic of the rising importance of digital media in the UK and worldwide; while broadcast television remains the king of brand advertising, marketing and advertising are becoming less TV-centric.

UK consumers have embraced data-hungry services like Facebook and Google, but many also have concerns about privacy online; young people have a more positive view of the trade-off and know how to avoid targeted advertising

Businesses that are conscientious about consumers’ data gain their trust, and the gap between trusted brands and the market as a whole may grow substantially in the future

Despite Edward Snowden’s revelations on ‘Big brother snooping’, the UK Government has secured vast access to communications data without serious challenge to date

2013 has seen yet another year of strong growth in consumer adoption of mobile devices and screens adding to the challenges facing traditional media. Press and radio have long been affected, but television is now starting to feel the heat

BT and Sky’s contest for premium pay-TV sports rights has intensified. August saw the launch of BT Sport, while BT’s acquisition of the European football rights in November was a clear statement of intent, spending half of Channel 4’s total programming budget on approx. 200 hours of content

The UK has seen buoyant advertising growth of around 4% in 2013, with similar growth expected in 2014, in the context of the strongest economic recovery in Europe

On 30 October, two days after criminal trials for alleged phone hacking begin, the Privy Council will finally seal a Royal Charter to set up regulation of the press. The end of this drawn-out process might be thought near

Several major publishers are planning to boycott the system by setting up their own regulator, which will not meet the Charter’s standards. In recent days, Conservative ministers have said the press is ‘free’ to take that route

The Recognition Panel set up by Parliament’s Royal Charter may not report on the system’s success or (more likely) failure until the autumn after the 2015 election. Whether to have a showdown with publishers who reject the Royal Charter is a decision being put off by everyone

Press display advertising fell 10% in 2012, and we forecast a slower decline this year (about 7%), as press benefits from the deluge of telecoms advertiser spend and the ongoing commitment of retailers to national newspapers and fashion and beauty brands to leading magazine

But structural factors are gathering pace relentlessly: circulation decline is accelerating in some categories and rate cards remain under pressure. Some smaller newspapers and poorly differentiated magazines face the possibility of an existential crisis in the next five years

Publishers able to embrace creative marketing solutions from an integrated digital and print platform will stimulate a more sustainable model in the medium term – but this requires a more radical rethink than is commonly assumed

Microsoft dominated PCs and Nokia mobile phones, but both are irrelevant in the dominant model for tech in the next decade, smartphones and tablets. An acquisition may have been necessary, but by itself it solves nothing.

Smartphones are now half of all mobile phone sales, and the 255m smartphones and tablets sold in Q2 2013 dwarf the 76m PCs sold. Microsoft now powers less than a quarter of all the personal computing devices being sold.

Microsoft retains a leading position in enterprise and in console gaming. But if it cannot return to relevance in consumer, the strength of the whole business will suffer.

Next-generation consoles from Sony and Microsoft, expected late this year/early next, will kick off a new cycle for the games industry, but enter a much more competitive market

Smartphones and tablets offer an alternative gaming model, with more variety, lower cost, greater convenience and, crucially, rapidly increasing sophistication

These new platforms are expanding gaming to a much larger audience, but also increasingly competing with consoles for the time and attention of core gamers. This could be the last recognisable console cycle

The Competition Commission has provisionally decided that local (but not national) advertisers will suffer if the Global/GMG radio merger is passed and its suggested remedies are for Global to divest stations outside London and the West Midlands or simply unravel the whole transaction.

If these provisional findings are confirmed in May 2013, Global will find itself in the unenviable position of looking for a purchaser or more of radio assets, since the transaction was finalised in June 2012.

Although the Competition Commission is likely to prefer a single buyer of the portfolio to minimize the purchaser’s risk, it may be content with a carve up of the GMG stations, in which case we see Bauer Media as being a strong contender for stations out-with its current footprint.