CHANGES TO BBC IPLAYER Competition assessment April 2019 Clive Kenny
[email protected] Frontier Economics Ltd is a member of the Frontier Economics network, which consists of two separate companies based in Europe (Frontier Economics Ltd) and Australia (Frontier Economics Pty Ltd). Both companies are independently owned, and legal commitments entered into by one company do not impose any obligations on the other company in the network. All views expressed in this document are the views of Frontier Economics Ltd. CHANGES TO BBC IPLAYER CONTENTS Executive Summary 5 1 Introduction 18 1.1 Structure of this report 18 2 Framework for assessing the impact of the BBC iPlayer changes on competition 20 2.1 Introduction 20 2.2 Regulatory framework to assess changes to the BBC’s services 20 2.3 Analytical framework for the assessment of crowding out 24 2.4 Analytical framework for the assessment of scope for harm to competition elsewhere in the supply chain 28 3 The competitive context for the proposed changes to BBC iPlayer 30 3.1 The audio-visual sector is characterised by constant innovation 30 3.2 VoD competes with linear broadcasters, as well as newer audio-visual suppliers 31 3.3 Technological advances have led to convergence between different forms of content 33 3.4 Entrant broadcasters have put pressure on broadcasters to compete and innovate 33 3.5 Conclusion on sector wide trends 35 4 Suppliers affected by the changes to BBC iPlayer 37 4.1 Introduction 37 4.2 The BBC iPlayer’s role in the TV value chain 37 4.3 Identifying