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Hostilities between Sky and Virgin have intensified during the course of cable’s re-launch, Sky’s announcement of its pay-DTT plans, and bilateral negotiations over channel carriage fee payments on the satellite and cable platforms

This report sets out the technological, regulatory and consumer demand issues relating to the provision of mobile TV services in the UK. In summary, technology is uncertain, spectrum is scarce and demand is weak but, nonetheless, we expect industry enthusiasm to drive full multi-channel broadcast services before the end of the decade

Yell UK is the dominant supplier of Classified Advertising Directory Services (CDAS) in the UK. Its principal competitor is BT but, as a natural monopoly, it is regulated, and has just undergone a sector review lifting the price caps currently in place. What does the future now hold for Yell, and more generally for CDAS, which has been the only growth sector in print classified advertising since 2004?

Strong second quarter subscriber figures, including 432,000 gross additions, the highest in six years, attest to a strong and improving product offer. To reach the core target of 10 million subscribers by 2010 will, however, require poaching many cable customers

Three sources of downside risk for Trader Media include: a sluggish car market impacting on print and online ad volumes; the decline of print ad volumes as a result of the shift to online and resulting compression of Trader’s operating margins; Trader’s powerful competitors in the online ad market, especially eBay

Trader’s valuation could be 10 to 11 times 2006 profit of £120 million, although a minority stake makes it difficult for a private equity investor to get in, slash the expensive print-based cost structure, and get out quickly

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

Trinity Mirror’s decision to sell certain regional newspaper and sports assets is ill-timed in view of the severe declines in newspaper circulation and advertising revenues across the industry, which could make it difficult for Trinity to realise its target price of £600 million

In continental Europe ‘public/private partnerships’ rolling out very high speed broadband (VHSB) access networks to consumers are the latest rage, with local governments pushing their own subsidy initiatives and seeking to secure cover from European Commission rules on state aid. These initiatives raise basic questions about the future of the telecommunications industry, including whether the supply of network infrastructure will be led by demand for applications or by the will of politicians, subsidies at hand

H3G has removed roaming charges for customers roaming onto its own overseas networks. While reducing roaming prices can be partially, or even fully, compensated for by elasticity effects, removing them altogether has far more limited direct compensations, especially when consumers are on bundle tariffs