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Canal+ Acquires M7 For 1 Billion Euros

Canal+ acquires M7 for 1 Billion Euros

End of 2018 the news has been dominated by the mega mergers’ announcement among US media companies and the launch of their VOD services.

Over the first few months of 2019 Europe is back in the news with a wave of mergers that if they do not have the magnitude of their US counterpart are signs of the very same consolidation phenomena. The most prominent one is Vodafone / Liberty Global. Recently we have seen the emergence of what could become a German Studio building on the KKR acquisition of Universum, Tele München, i&u Wiedemann & Berg.

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The Secret Breakfast Of The Hollywood Studio Bosses

The secret breakfast of the Hollywood studio bosses

Green Book, the Favorite, BlacKkKlansman, Bohemian Rhapsody, the Mule, Vice, a Beautiful Boy, Yuli, Loro, Molly’s game, Operation 12 strong … over the past few months an unusual large number of movies have been biopics or based on true facts. Other years the dominant genre have been science fiction or romantic comedy. Like in the fashion industry the movie one has trends. For those not familiar with the mechanics I strongly advice watching the scene in “Devil’s wears Prada” where Miranda Priestly explains Andy Sacks why she is wearing a blue sweater.

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Technology Innovation Days 2019

Technology Innovation Days 2019

The Technology Innovation Days organised with 3IT the Innovation Center for immersive imaging technologies of the Frauenhofer Institut in Berlin ahead of the Berlinale have become an important yearly event for broadcasters, media production, technology vendors and researchers in the broadcast media space.

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Mythbuster: VOD Offers Infinite Content Choice

Mythbuster: VOD offers infinite content choice

There is a popular believe that everything is available on line. The sheer magnitude of content accessible through the different VOD services (Add, Transaction, Subscription, Free) seems to prove the point but is it the really the case?

To limit the scope, the purpose is not to deep dive in the fascinating topic of regional licensing or windowing but to focus on the reality of viewer consumption and the basic economics of a VOD service.

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Which Hulu Could Be A Model For European S-VOD Joined Ventures?

Which Hulu could be a model for European S-VOD joined ventures?

I wrote quite a few posts on the necessity for European media organization to team up in an OTT landscape that changes the multinational and where scale is a more significant success factor then regionalization. Many initiatives describe themselves as the French, Spanish, German or British Hulu. It is mainly because similarly to Hulu they are joined ventures of existing broadcast media organizations.

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Keynote At The FIT Conference @ IRT

Keynote at the FIT conference @ IRT

Presenting a keynote in front of over 150 reprentatives of the German, Swiss and Austrian public broadcasters during their annual technical network IT conference has been a great experience. The paper on the impact of the business model changes on technology investment in the TV4.0 era triggered a lot of discussions over the two days of the workshop in a Munich. The fact that Bayerischer Rundfunk is rebuilding a significant part of its technical operations to create a tri media production centre just in front of the IRT building was a perfect illustration of the changes in the broadcast media industry.

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Die Neue Welle Der Deutsch-französischen Merger: „Post-Merger Integration Als Schlüsselfaktor Des Erfolgs„

Die neue Welle der deutsch-französischen Merger: „Post-Merger Integration als Schlüsselfaktor des Erfolgs„

10th Franco Bavarian Dinner: Over the last few years a new wave of mergers and acquisitions is going on between French and German companies from start ups and service companies to global players. They all have in common the challenge of post merger integration. If not properly anticipated and acted on it puts the process and the expected value creation at stake.

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The Final Episode Of The 40B$ Battle For Sky!

The final episode of the 40B$ battle for Sky!

Comcast has won over Disney and the battle for the domination of the European pay TV is now over. There was no binge-watching possibility and week after week new episodes were published as in good old linear days. All the ingredients of a good epic series were present: strong charismatic characters, lots of money, great plot, tension, unexpected surprises, hangovers and a breath taking final.

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Why Is Hall 14 At IBC A Tent?

Why is hall 14 at IBC a tent?

For those of you not familiar with the IBC trade show in Amsterdam many of the following references will sound cryptic. Every year over 55.000 broadcast media professionals from around the world gather in Amsterdam for a massive 5 days trade show with 1.700 exhibitors the International Broadcasting Convention (IBC). Since 2012 despite a continuous wave of M&As the floor space requirement growth has pushed the organizers to create an extra hall 14 in form of an oversized tent.

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Why Are Broadcast Media Service Companies Consolidating?

Why are broadcast media service companies consolidating?

A lot has been written about the mergers amongst the US media giants and the Netflix and Amazon impact. The acquisition of Babcock by Encompass is a good opportunity to have a look at another piece of the eco system and analyze the drivers behind media service companies consolidation. The wave actually started over 15 years ago when Ascent Media acquired multiple facilities around the globe.

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