Tech companies are approaching terminal velocity on capex, which will surpass a $500 billion annual run-rate in early 2026. Apple is out of position on AI; CEO Tim Cook has signalled a willingness to consider M&A yet also faces acute political strain in the US

Despite revenues surpassing $2 trillion in 2025, tech is in a fragile transition as most cloud growth is still not driven by gen AI—tariffs, uneven compute build-out and US economic impacts may deliver a bumpy landing in quarters ahead

European tech sovereignty is a mounting political issue, as the continent fights the White House on its regulatory red lines. The financial and cultural impacts of Europe’s lack of tech champions remain intractable

Disney’s streaming business continues to grow meaningfully, now outpacing the somewhat predictable decline of its linear operation. Studios is always a highwire act, but it is currently the source of most of Disney’s uncertainty.

With subscription numbers quite flat and engagement likely subdued, in the US Disney is hoping that product improvements and sport will invigorate the relationship that users have with its services.

In the UK, the Disney+ and ITVX content swap arrangement is off to a slow start.

Prime Video UK viewing has increased by 30% year-on-year. Although this growth is from a smaller base than its main rivals, it now matches Disney+ in total engagement.

Viewing behaviour now reflects a service that is more than just an add-on: those who use it alongside Netflix do so for its breadth, particularly in film, whilst non-Netflix viewers are drawn to its major UK hits and football coverage.

Supplementing consistent viewing to football and scripted box sets, its ability to attract mass audiences to its hit original shows now rivals some broadcasters.

BT started its FY26 with robust financials. Revenue was slightly weak due to handsets and international, but EBITDA was slightly ahead of expectations, and operating metrics were strong.

The highlight was Openreach posting its lowest broadband line losses for over a year despite ongoing altnet pressure, and keeping revenue growth positive despite reduced inflationary price increases.

The altnet threat is still far from over, but it is encouraging that there are signs that it is beginning to wane as the sub-sector moves to a more rational wholesale model.

With no major men’s football tournament, ITV’s advertising revenue fell well short of a tough YoY comparison (-7%, £824 million) while Studios appears to be settling after a demanding last couple of years (+3%, £893 million)

ITVX is showing encouraging momentum—especially in terms of its usage profile—however, as a whole, ITV saw viewing share again decline, while losing another 600k regular-viewing households

This market demands proactivity—hence the announcement of collaboration between the three major sale houses, and further measures by ITV to target small to medium-sized businesses

Netflix improved on its Q2 revenue and profit forecasts, driven by successful implementation of price rises and USD weakness. There continues to be little substantive information offered about the advertising business

Most of Netflix’s engagement growth is derived from its existing heavy users. Lighter users, who are more susceptible to churn, appear to be most under pressure from YouTube

In the UK, new Netflix original content no longer appears to be driving new subscriptions. This means it can be better used to shape engagement in a way that optimises monetisation

CityFibre has announced that its long-awaited £1.5 to £2.3 billion financing round is finally agreed, with it now able to use this money to fund its remaining organic build, integrating acquisitions, and covering operating losses until it reaches cashflow breakeven.

This capital raise will not be the first of many across the altnet sector in our view, as CityFibre’s business model is unique, and now partially dependent on the struggles of others to encourage consolidation.

CityFibre now has all the pieces in place to accelerate consolidation of the altnet sector, which will ultimately benefit the whole sector in ending unsustainable retail altnet competition.

Publishers are becoming less visible. Since 2019, publisher visibility on Google’s search results has diminished markedly—the Mail is less than half as visible in Google’s search results as it was five years ago.

Since March, publishers' keywords have become over three times more likely to trigger an AI Overview, now affecting around one-third of the Sun and Mirror’s keywords. These summaries mostly appear for entertainment and informational queries, which typically have high search volumes but lower click-through rates

The commercial impact is minimal—we estimate low-single digits—for now. The main threat is to discoverability, and the shrinkage of the top of the funnel

Fixing an allocation quirk at BT pushed UK broadband revenue back into growth in Q1, albeit a very modest 0.8%, thanks to continued altnet growth and a very weak underlying market.

Broadband pricing is dipping down overall, but there is not yet evidence of pricing cuts targeted in altnet areas, a massive missed opportunity in our view.

The market will remain under pressure in the short term, but in the longer term altnet pressure will fall under all realistic consolidation scenarios.
 

Sky has officially launched on CityFibre’s network, offering up to 5Gbps speeds, which may have more of a halo effect for Sky than driving direct adoption of these very high end packages.

Sky is critical to CityFibre’s wholesale model given its size, and it is a good sign that Sky is proving an enthusiastic wholesale customer, while it is likely to be wary of others.

CityFibre still needs to complete its planned financing round to kick off a wholesale-focused consolidation wave, which would ultimately be beneficial to all incumbents in ending irrational price competition from retail altnets.