OTT Question Time Live – The Power of Partnerships
As the UK TV landscape evolves, collaboration is key to unlocking new opportunities. In this fireside chat, Gabriel Cosgrave, SVP Global Sales & Revenue from TiVo, Jonathan Thompson, CEO of Everyone TV and Alex Arbab-Zadeh, COO of Manhattan TV shared how their partnership is taking advantage of the shift to IP-only ...
OTT Question Time Live 2026 – The Strategists
As the streaming market enters a more mature phase, growth in 2026 is being redefined well beyond headline scale. With most services now operating across SVOD and AVOD, success is increasingly measured through a combination of advertising yield, engagement, profitability, and brand strength. This session explored how strategy ...
OTT Question Time Live 2026 – Incremental vs. Transformational Growth
As AVOD platforms scale and mature, the question is no longer whether growth is possible, but what kind of growth actually matters. This fireside chat contrasted incremental progress (optimisation, partnerships, yield, and reach) with the more transformational shifts required to stand out in an increasingly crowded market. Against ...
OTT Question Time Live 2026 – Monetising on YouTube & Facebook
It’s widely acknowledged that YouTube is now TV and the largest broadcaster in the US. But how can studios, broadcasters, and producers truly unlock the full potential of this powerful distribution channel? Merzigo has been at the forefront of this evolution in the TV landscape, and its Chief ...
OTT Question Time Live 2026 – The Partnership Builders
In a fragmented, capital-constrained market, partnerships have moved from optional accelerators to core growth infrastructure. Broadcasters and streamers are increasingly relying on strategic alliances – with other media owners, aggregators, telcos, device makers, and technology vendors – to extend reach, manage costs, and unlock new revenue streams. This ...
OTT Question Time Live 2026 – Vertical Content Strategies
In our opening panel at OTTQTL26 we discussed vertical content. Vertical, short-form video has become a primary driver of discovery, fandom, and creative experimentation – particularly for under-35s. Platforms such as YouTube, TikTok, and Instagram are reshaping how stories are structured, how audiences engage, and where attention is ...
Riffs Episode #10 – End of Season Show
Sure, it's only an industry podcast / webcast but in this final episode of Season 1, Lydia and I discuss some genuine cliffhangers: An update on the Netflix / Paramount Skydance bids for Warner Bros Discovery The future of the BBC licence fee following the publication of a ...
Netflix, WBD & Content Efficiency
Two weeks ago, when Stranger Things 5 had just dropped, I thought it would be good to write about the performance of previous seasons so that we might be able to predict viewing figures. And then Netflix apparently acquired WBD and all hell broke loose. The article thus ...
Riffs Episode #9 – Netflix, WBD & Are We Legacy?
In this episode, Lydia and I discuss the Netflix bid for Warner Bros Discovery which, in the Netflix comms that followed, made it sound like a done deal. I think it's fair to say that whereas Lydia was quite bullish about the acquisition, I was (and still am) ...
Why Comcast Bid £1.6bn for ITV’s M&E Business
Comcast’s (opening?) bid for ITV’s M&E (Broadcast) business last week was… unexpected. Aside from feeling like a lowball offer, it was puzzling even to former ITV veterans. Peter Fincham, for example, who was Director of Television from 2008-2016, told BBC Radio that the relationship between the broadcast business ...
ITV Revenues, 2019-24
Following Comcast's £1.6bn bid for ITV's Media & Entertainment (Broadcast) business, I've been looking at the broadcaster's financial performance over the last few years. Why did Comcast offer that number - £1.6bn? I've written a separate post about that but in this piece, I've outlined some of the ...
Riffs Episode #8 – BBC Resignations & Comcast bids for ITV
When the news broke that Comcast had bid £1.6bn for ITV, Lydia and I thought, hands down, it would be the biggest story of the week. But then Tim Davie, Director General of the BBC resigned. Cue hasty updates to this episode where we discuss both developments. On ...
Riffs Episode #7 – Netflix Numbers & Product Placement
Lydia and I were on a break last week (not in the Ross and Rachel in Friends kinda way!) so we didn't get a chance to comment on Netflix's Q3 financials. That's easily fixed - we discuss them in this episode where we particularly focus on what Netflix ...
The Industrialisation of Netflix
Whenever Netflix’s latest financials are published, the topline data is always the stuff the press focuses on: revenue, content spend, subscriber numbers. Totally understandable, obviously: they tell a story about the health, performance and strategy of the company. But what’s just as important – to me at least ...
Orchestrated Growth & the Seventh Major OTT Cycle
There’s an idea that it’s only after a decade is over that one can – retrospectively – characterise it; distil 10 years into a few words (fairly or not). So, the 60s might be Flower Power and/or civil action. The 70s: disco (and flares). The 80s: yuppies; get ...
OTT Question Time Online, Season 6, Episode 5 – The Changing Face of News
On this week's OTT Question Time Online we discussed the changing face of news provision - on linear and OTT - with Joe Harbinson, Head of Commercial Partnerships from Sky News, Stephen Hull, Head of Digital Content & Strategy (News) from ITV, and Jonny McGuigan, Executive Editor: Growth, ...
Riffs Episode #6 – Channel 4 & ITV
On last week's Riffs episode, Lydia and I talked about the BBC and potential changes to the licence. This week, and to share the love, we focused on Channel 4 and ITV, who have both made a number of announcements lately. Channel 4 Channel 4 had a stellar ...
New OTT Use Case: Man-Flu
I was in bed most of the weekend, and Monday too, with a cold. And whilst I was mostly sleeping, or reading, I did manage to stream some shows, mainly on the marvel that is Amazon Prime Video. Why “marvel”? For a number of reasons but, just initially, ...
New Studios from Channel 4 & Hearst Networks
The TV and OTT world is thrillingly complex. The glass-to-glass process, for example, the chain of events via which content gets from the first glass (the lens of the camera shooting the footage) to the last glass (the screen on which the viewer watches it) contains 30-40 links ...
Riffs Episode #5 – The BBC Licence Fee
At the Labour Party conference last week, Lisa Nandy, Secretary of State for the Department of Culture, Media & Sport, said that she was looking at a mixed funding format for the BBC to help protect it from future government interference. Options included a “mixture of licence fee, ...