UEFA and Relevent, a newly appointed media rights sales partner, are already surveying the rights market for the next cycle starting in 2027.
With minimal competitive tension in major European markets, incumbent broadcasters are unlikely to increase their bids.
Relevent will, however, try to leverage increased US appetite for soccer to lure a streamer into a global deal.
Looking to 2030, we forecast that broadcaster viewing will continue to decline, driven by a drop in live viewing. Non-live is increasing but will be unable to make up for the total broadcaster shortfall.
Change is demarcated by age: while under-35s will watch more YouTube on the TV, with SVOD steady, the inverse will occur for over-35s.
The heavy-watching over-65s remain mostly insulated from change for now, however, those aged 35-54 are currently undergoing the biggest behavioural shift: beyond 2030 they will eventually carry their modern habits into their time-rich retirements.
The Berlusconi family-backed MediaForEurope’s (MFE) public offer may not be taken up by many ProSiebenSat.1 (P7) shareholders, but will allow it to raise its stake to above 30%.
Without a core shareholder, ProSieben has flipped-flopped through unsuccessful strategies to meet the digital transition challenge.
MFE believes that European commercial television must build cross-border scale to compete with global streamers.
Globally, subscriber growth remains the driver of topline streaming improvements—86% of Netflix’s 2024 global revenue growth came from subscriber additions, with 85% for WBD and 54% for Disney
However, in mature markets growth is underpinned by ARPU. Subs growth is becoming volatile with more customers churning in and out of services around key releases
Relevantly, the race to scale up SVOD ad-tiers will continue to have an ARPU-dilutive effect: CPMs are lower than expected and the growing price divide between premium and ad tiers will persuade more existing users to spin down
The requirement for accurate audience measurement led to the creation of separate industry JICs— developed by media owners, agencies, advertisers and trade bodies—used for planning and as credible trading currencies.
However, now as brand advertisers need to be able to optimise campaigns across all audiovisual—and ideally all display—they want full cross-media measurement, and are therefore investing in the Origin platform.
But not all ‘views’ are equal; context is important. While most advertisers understand this, there is a risk that some ascribe the same value to all AV. Broadcasters are understandably wary.
Recent deals for Ligue 1, the Fifa Club World Cup and Foxtel signal DAZN is focused on global expansion, but this has postponed group breakeven.
Rights have been renewed at lower costs due to tepid competition and wider uncertainty in the broadcasting landscape, which support its improving margins.
Global scale may be a competitive advantage, but DAZN must still prove that global synergies improve local economics and generate a positive margin.
Disney's phase of consolidation began with profit growth for its streaming business, pushed up by price rises with subscriber numbers reasonably flat. Emboldened by less churn than expected, Disney+ will be more expensive sooner rather than later
Disney+'s UK reach—a proxy for subscriptions—remains firm but under pressure with engagement materially suffering as the flow of new programming has slowed. Library content is D+'s strength, but viewing of it is correlated with new releases
The creation of sports channel bundle Venu ran the risk of accelerating the decline of Disney's linear business. The service's delay and failure to launch may have given time for the company to reappraise its approach to linear
Broadcaster reach and viewing fell in 2024, but the decline slowed as BVOD growth increasingly makes up for linear decline and the BBC’s viewing grew year-on-year.
SVOD penetration and engagement returned to (slight) growth in 2024 and video-sharing platforms are increasing their share of TV set viewing.
Broadcasters still offer a wider array of programming than SVODs, but they are expanding their offering, as is YouTube.
Global streamers have expanded their US premium sports coverage, but this will be difficult to replicate in Europe.
The main obstacle is much lower advertising revenues in European sport.
The concentration of European football rights and small pools of buyers mean that premium sports must be retailed on an opt-in basis.
Very strong subscription additions in all regions (+16% YoY, to 302 million) drove Netflix's quarterly revenue over $10 billion for the first time (+16% YoY). The advertising push appears to be continuing to dampen ARPU growth, ushering in more price rises
Netflix now has a defined advertising audience that does not watch commercial television—however, for this incremental audience to materially grow, longer-term users must be manoeuvred from the ad-free tiers
Netflix's original content slate has plateaued in major countries. If budgets have to absorb the growth of live content, there will be ramifications on the output of other genres, along with levels of market demand and production costs