Following years of decline, France Télécom’s revenue from its fixed line business (‘Home France’) rose €248 million in 2007. Rising retail and wholesale broadband revenue (plus WLR) more than offset falling line rental and call revenue for the first time

Dramatic growth in datacards and Blackberry users has fuelled excitement that the mobile internet is finally arriving to the mass market, even though these remain largely business devices

Setanta is the subject of takeover speculation and this report considers the opportunity, the challenge, and the risks that a purchase represents. Setanta's ownership of live televised rights to premium UK football content tantalises potential investors, but they will need to assess the cost of hanging on to those rights at the next auction in 2009. Potential bidders include ITV, Virgin Media, BT and ESPN, with a fifth, unnamed bidder in the background

Microsoft’s $44.6 billion offer for Yahoo! represents the software giant’s last opportunity to compete with Google in the rapidly growing market for online advertising, which is forecast to double to $80 billion within three years

This report examines whether Sky has grounds to appeal the decision by the Competition Commission requiring Sky to partly divest its ITV stake. The deadline for Sky's decision on appeal is 25th February. Bearing in mind that the CC has a good track record on fighting appeals, this report identifies two potential grounds for appeal that could prove fruitful for Sky to appeal. If Sky does appeal, and we suspect it will, the uncertainty weighing on ITV's share price will continue for some time yet

France’s football rights auction for the four seasons starting in 2008 ended with a second round on 6th February. Canal+ will keep most rights, while France Télécom picks up some live rights for the first time

Yell announced this week that full year sales growth (to March 2008) in its UK operations would be 2%, sharply down from the previously forecast 3%, due to “toughening market conditions” since the start of 2008

Increasing loss of retail call market share and continuing decline in wholesale revenue stunted growth in group revenue, which would have dropped slightly without help from acquisitions

Sky's Q2 results show continuing strong growth across all parts of its multi-product business, with bumper product sales, up by almost a third year-on-year

France is the first major European market where a large scale fibre-to-the-home (FTTH) deployment is under way. Numericable and France Télécom, as well as unbundlers Iliad and Neuf Cegetel, are launching triple play offers over fibre to households. Public authorities actively support the plans, to boost France's growth prospects. This report examines the commercial context for fibre deployment in France