Service revenue growth remained firmly negative at -1.0% in spite of inflation of +2.1%, as competition remains intense and pricing power weak.
Operators are guiding to a 2025 EBITDA performance that is broadly in-line with, or weaker than, their 2024 performance, with SFR choosing to abstain from guidance this year.
In-market consolidation cries are getting louder, with France, Italy and Germany the most obvious candidates.
Geopolitical clashes between the US and Europe were a barely concealed undercurrent at this year’s MWC, with European tech regulation at odds with US moves, and telcos pitching for regulatory favours on firmer ground than they have had for years.
Perhaps the largest impact is on the satellite industry, with Eutelsat OneWeb having been given a new lease of life as the EU champion versus a now disfavoured SpaceX/Starlink.
AI was of course the talk of the town, but largely in ways that are tangential at best to traditional telcos, with the necessary building blocks for telcos to play a big role (i.e. network APIs) still needing much work.
Service revenue growth dropped further to -1.7% this quarter as pricing remains under pressure and in-contract price increases no longer benefit
Competition is heating up in Germany and France, and Digi is taking an aggressive stance as it enters the Portuguese and Belgian markets
While there is increasing awareness that investment levels in Europe are compromised by the current market structure, support for in-market consolidation remains lukewarm at best at the EU level
Magazines are in the final phase of industrial-scale print volumes, with the era of artisan print magazines already highly visible and blooming, celebrating the reader’s tangible experience of the design and rich content, drawn by the brand’s authority.
Publishers’ online revenue models have diversified by attracting third-party sources—advertisers, campaign partners and affiliates—alongside a relatively tepid commitment to audience-led revenue models, with exceptions.
Publishers seeking a sustainable digital future by circa 2030 will need to focus more on audiences than on advertisers, leveraging core brands across multiple channels to build community, with print playing a narrower, lucrative and much-loved role.
Broadcaster decline accelerated in 2022, with record drops in reach and time spent. This was primarily driven by the lightest and youngest viewers leaving broadcast television while over-65s also reduced their viewing for the first time.
Loss of lighter viewers threatens the future viewing base of broadcasters and relevance to a new generation. Further, broadcaster status as the home of mass audiences becomes compromised.
However, retention of lighter viewers is not yet a lost cause. They are amongst the heaviest Netflix viewers, and the very lightest are spending more time in front of the TV set than previously—suggesting enduring appetite for TV-like content.
Magazine publishers are at different stages of a transformation cycle, but a variety of external and industry factors are massively accelerating change.
Often described as the transition from page to screen, in reality transformation is a deeper redefinition of each brand’s community and purpose, and the use-case benefits it delivers.
Online advertising is evolving into a space where trusted consumer media can exploit their advantages of community engagement and premium context, rather than indiscriminate traffic.
With viewing to traditional broadcast TV continuing to shrink rapidly, especially among under-45s, our latest forecasts revise a new low for broadcasters’ audiences: falling to just half of all video viewing in 2027, down from 63% today
Long-form, broadcast-quality content will increasingly be viewed on SVOD-first services (e.g. Netflix, Amazon, Disney+) as online habits solidify, especially among older audiences. Platforms offering different content (e.g. YouTube, Twitch, TikTok) will continue to grow their share and will also expand total watch-time
We forecast that under-35s will spend just a tenth to a fifth of their video time with broadcasters’ traditional long-form content five years from now, versus a third to a half for 35-54s and 85% for over-65s
Despite linear TV viewing benefiting from recent lockdowns, across 2020 it still declined among younger audiences. Online video habits have solidified, most notably for adults in their 30s and 40s
As a result, traditional broadcasters are more vulnerable now than ever before. Long term, we forecast their audiences to fall further than previously expected—down to 61% of all video viewing in 2027 from 72% today—as streaming platforms make ever-deeper inroads
Given linear TV’s reliance on older cohorts, plus an ageing UK population, we predict that two-thirds of traditional broadcasters’ viewing in 2027 will come from over-55s, with less than 13% from under-35s
The UK lockdown since mid March has boosted TV time to levels not seen since 2014, with broadcast TV and online video each growing by nearly 40
minutes/person/day
While trends vary significantly by demographic, news consumption has been a common catalyst for linear TV’s growth, benefitting the BBC above all. Although Sky News has also flourished, Sky’s portfolio has been seriously impacted by the lack of live sport
2019 extended many of the long running trends of the last decade, but, notably, online video’s growth rate appeared to slow among youngsters, in contrast to older demographics. 35-54 year olds watching more VOD will have significant implications for linear broadcasters down the line
Consumer magazine circulation and advertising continue to spiral down, with notable exceptions at the top of the market and in a handful of key genres, triggering ever greater revenue diversification and innovation The market is fundamentally over-supplied and the gap between successful portfolios and the glut of secondary titles is growing. Furthermore, the distribution and retail supply chain hang by a thread There are some encouraging signs. Publishers are evolving, with their strategies and leadership capabilities increasingly defined by the needs of the industry they serve rather than the publishing brands they exploit, bringing the consumer model closer to more thoroughbred B2B models