Product Strategy | MIDiA Research

The future has finally arrived – streaming supplants pay-TV

Tim Mulligan

16 Dec 2019

It was a long time in coming, but what was always on the horizon has now become a reality as subscription video on demand (SVOD) has finally supplanted pay-TV to become the main paid video consumption format.

min read

How will finance’s interest in music impact the industry compared to big tech?

Zach Fuller

16 Dec 2019

big tech

live music

music finance

With Hipgnosis continuing to acquire copyright, coupled with Warner Music Group and Providence Equity’s announcement of Tempo Music Investments, the finance industry’s interest in the recorded music business continues to gather momentum.

min read

The Paywall Paradox
Ring Fencing Advertising’s Most Valuable Consumers

Mark Mulligan

December 2019

Spotify

Marketing

Amazon

Music and video subscribers are the most influential technology and brand advocates amongst their peer groups and are therefore the most valuable users for advertisers and brands to reach. They are consuming progressively more content behind paywalls, which, as predominately ad-free spaces, represents a growing challenge for marketers.

Demand creation: What’s the next big growth curve for music?

Keith Jopling

11 Dec 2019

Music

Business Strategy

At Spotify’s last quarterly reporting session, CEO Daniel Ek talked about the company’s creator strategy, as part of the wider development of becoming a “2-sided marketplace”: “The strategy has been about going from a one-size fits all model to a model that better fits the various types of...

min read

What Star Wars in Fortnite tells us about the future of digital entertainment

Karol Severin

10 Dec 2019

cross-entertainment strategy

Disney

Entertainment

It has been revealed that Disney will soon be premiering a scene from its upcoming The Rise of Skywalker film (per engadget ). What makes this a truly newsworthy story is that the event will take place inside Fortnite ’s Risky Reels digital drive-in theatre, apparently with J.

min read

20/20 Vision
MIDiA Research Predictions 2020

Alistair Taylor, Amanda Stears, Karol Severin, Keith Jopling, Mark Mulligan, Tim Mulligan and Zach Fuller

December 2019

Apple

Spotify

Discovery

In this report MIDiA Research analysts present their predictions for what will be the big trends in digital media and tech across music, video, media, brands, marketing, games and sports in 2020 and the coming decade. Companies and brands mentioned in...

Is Comcast’s D2C move digital peacocking?

Tim Mulligan

9 Dec 2019

Comcast

d2c

Peacock

On January 16th 2020, Comcast will be holding an investor day meeting to provide further clarity around Peacock – its forthcoming ad-supported direct to consumer (D2C) video streaming service. The focus of the meeting will be to address “the overarching strategy for the platform”.

min read

Music Subscriber Market Shares H1 2019

Mark Mulligan

5 Dec 2019

midia market shares

Music market shares

Tencent Music Entertainment

The global streaming market continues to grow at pace. At the end of June 2019 there were 304.9 million music subscribers globally. That was up 34 million on the end of 2018, while the June 2018 to June 2019 growth was 69 million – exactly the same rate of additions as one year earlier.

min read

Streaming Pricing
Solid Outlook but Slowing Demand

Mark Mulligan

December 2019

Willingness to pay

Apple

Netflix

Across a wide selection of Western countries, the streaming music and video subscription markets are reaching a high degree of maturity. As saturation for core products nears, further growth will depend upon factors such as pricing innovation and multiple subscriptions per household.

Spotify Podcast Strategy
Strong Start, Long Way to Go

Cover image for Spotify Podcast Strategy

Mark Mulligan

November 2019

Spotify

Pandora

Spotify has bet big on podcasts, viewing them as a means to multiple strategic ends. After a number of major acquisitions, Spotify is beginning to deliver meaningful audience and revenue numbers. Though it is still early days for Spotify’s podcast strategy, there is clear long-term potential to transform the wider audio landscape.

Roku aims for TV market share with European expansion

Amanda Stears

26 Nov 2019

Hisense

Hisense Roku TV

Pay TV

Roku has partnered with manufacturer Hisense to release its first Roku TV in the UK this coming Black Friday at Argos. Announced September 7th at the IFA 2019 a.k.a Berlin Radio Show, these smart TVs are powered by the Roku OS.

min read

The imitation game: Why first-mover advantage could lose its allure in tech strategy

Zach Fuller

25 Nov 2019

advertising

Media and Marketing

Business Strategy

"Originality is nothing but judicious imitation." - Voltaire "Good artists copy;great artists steal." - Steve Jobs Being the first is overrated when it means you can instantly be copied. The ‘time profit’ strategy is one of the most widely utilised models in tech-centric business.

min read

BT Sport’s key ingredient for competing in an increasingly saturated landscape

Alistair Taylor

22 Nov 2019

BT Sport

DAZN

domestic rights

The strategic dilemma as to whether rights holders should seek revenue over reach when allocating domestic rights is inevitably impacted by how dependent services are on premium rights for securing subscriber revenue.

min read

Why Apple wants the father of dragons on board

Tim Mulligan

20 Nov 2019

Game of Thrones

HBO

Online video

The November 1stlaunch of Apple TV+ has thrust the world’s leading personal device company into the increasingly frenetic world of TV. While the TV networks have long battled for supremacy over ratings and talent, leading SVOD service Netflix aggravated the market by aggressively bidding for exclu...

min read

Take Five (the big five stories and data you need to know) November 18th 2019

Mark Mulligan

18 Nov 2019

BT

bytedance

Disney

Bytedance subscription: Bytedance, parent of TikTok, is reportedlyclose to launching a music subscription service, initially focused on emerging markets. The big question is whether Bytedance will get the deals to launch something genuinely new, built on TikTok’s foundation, or just end up launchi...

min read

Why the music industry needs ByteDance to disrupt it

Mark Mulligan

18 Nov 2019

Innovation

Music

bytedance

Back in September 2018 I suggested that Spotify faced a Tencent risk ,with the potential of Tencent launching a competitive offering in markets that Spotify is not yet in. This would effectively divide the world between Spotify in Europe, Americas and some of Asia, and Tencent potentially everywhere...

min read

Spotify Earnings Q3 2019
Up on Most Counts

Cover image for Spotify Earnings Q3 2019

Mark Mulligan

November 2019

Subscriptions

Streaming

Streaming Music

Q3 2019 was a quarter of mixed fortunes for Spotify, with its subscriber base showing good, consistent growth, podcasts making a solid early showing, emerging markets demonstrating promise but ad revenue falling short. Companies and brands mentioned in...

Infostructure and the barriers to innovation

Zach Fuller

15 Nov 2019

infostructure

Innovation

media tech

Or, Why the United States Never Built High-Speed Connecting Railways Disruption is never simple, and what is often logically more efficient rarely wins out in the game of adoption. This process has a storied history in consumer tech: Betamax and VHS, DVD and Blue-Ray – but its roots go back even f...

min read

Meet the Speakers – The Economist, BGI, Spotify #Postpeak

Dara Jegede

12 Nov 2019

Business Strategy

If you're in London next Wednesday (November 20th) , come along to our free-to-attend attention economy event . There will also be a live stream (for those not based in London), which you will be able to find here at 7pm GMT.

min read

The attention economy has peaked. Now what?

Mark Mulligan

12 Nov 2019

Attention economy

Business Strategy

Regular followers of MIDiA will know that we’ve been writing about the attention economy for a number of years now. Throughout 2019 we have been building the concept that we have arrived at peak in the attention economy – that all of the addressable free time has been addressed.

min read