François Godard, an analyst at Enders Analysis, has pointed out that the U.K. regulator recently blocked a deal for RedBird Capital Partners — backed by Abu Dhabi-based International Media Investments (IMI) to buy the Telegraph Media Group.
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Enders Analysis was mentioned in the Financial Times on "European broadcasters need to look to Paramount-style M&A"
4 March 2026The pressures to do a deal are similar to those that prompted Netflix and Paramount to duke it out for WBD. Streaming, social media feeds and content providers like YouTube are all jostling for audience share. The result is that, in the UK, households have cut the time they spend watching public service broadcasters to 88 minutes a day, roughly half what it was a decade ago. And those aged 16-34 watch for just 21 minutes, according to Enders Analysis.
They weren’t alone – indeed Enders Analysis found that around half of media groups reported a decline in search traffic over the past year, thanks to AI Overviews impacting website visits.
The need to grasp this opportunity led the PPA to commission a major new report with Enders Analysis.
The purpose of the report was to move beyond anecdote and look “right back to the fundamentals” of people’s behaviour, what they do, what they trust, and what they value. The report found that 77% of users want to know if content has been created by AI, and that “authentic, personal, original” is the most valued attribute of human-generated content (81%).
The report also found that publishers should frame their strategy around four durable customer needs: trust, relevance, utility and community. Vitally, it also suggested that the winning strategies will be those that meet consumers where they are, with formats and services designed for how people actually behave now.
It is therefore a battle for hegemony that the Hollywood giants are waging. The objective: to reach critical mass and recoup the enormous investments in content demanded by the market. And the leader knows how to set the pace: for 2026 alone, Netflix will inject no less than $20 billion. So what can the competition do? "Consolidation is inevitable," replies François Godard, an analyst at Enders Analysis.
The cultural and social relevance of European broadcasting is in danger of being diluted.
Increasing pressure over the commercial free-to-air model threatens high-reach news delivery.
In-market mergers among European broadcasters may be necessary to reach the critical size to sustain high-quality, content-driven platforms.
Tom Harrington was quoted in The Observer on "The battle between Paramount and Netflix for Warner Bros is a fight for the soul of Hollywood"
27 February 2026Tom Harrington at Enders Analysis says: “Whatever they say, when Fox combined with Disney, they made fewer films. When people merge, they make less stuff. It's just how it works. So there’s fewer films costing more money meaning there’s not enough stuff in the cinema to attract a lot of people regularly. The cinema business model is not really selling cinema tickets as 60% of that money goes to the studio. It’s getting people in every night to sell popcorn and drinks. That model thrives on people going more rather than less.”
Enders Analysis was mentioned in the Financial Times on "English Premier League to launch streaming service in international shake-up"
27 February 2026According to figures from Enders Analysis, the league brought in €2.1bn from such deals last season, compared with €1.4bn for the Spanish, German, Italian and French leagues combined.
Major music AI deals: A pivotal year begins with red lines in place
26 February 2026Major labels have announced a slew of AI deals designed to shape nascent technology on their own terms, and so avoid repeating the mistakes of the early streaming era.
AI music startups will relaunch their services this year enforcing labels’ red lines on copyrighted music. The music industry’s material impact on AI products is in stark contrast to video and news industry engagement.
Google’s decade-long interest in AI music is moving into action with the launch of Lyria 3 and the acquisition of ProducerAI as a leading exponent of advanced, AI-enabled music creation—YouTube remains a sleeping giant.
Disney’s decision to license to OpenAI’s Sora is necessary to regain agency in a consumer ecosystem dominated by rampant unlicensed IP usage. The deal reflects an ongoing pattern of opportunistic, equity-driven deals by Disney in high-profile technology categories.
Movie and TV content owners’ ability to replicate similar deals to protect their IP assets is limited by vague engagement pathways and opaque or non-existent revenue sharing models combined with dealmaking constraints at AI operators, some of which are developed in China.
Even within the parameters of a deal, the ongoing risk of a public display of malfunctioning guardrails with licensed IP is real, as it is on non-licensed models. In-house AI expertise and stronger copyright compliance will require additional investment to ensure slippery usage is minimised.