Entertainment and media sector set to suffer 3.3% drop in revenue

THE ongoing economic downturn and lowering consumer spending patterns will likely result in a 3.3% drop in revenue for Ireland’s entertainment and media (E&M) sector this year, says PricewaterhouseCoopers.

PwC’s tenth annual Entertainment & Media Outlook, covering everything from consumer spend and Internet access levels to advertising trends over the five years to 2013, said a bottoming out next year would precede a return to modest growth by 2011.

While those sub-sectors most dependent on advertising spend will be badly hit by the recession, a number of sectors, according to the report, should continue to grow, including Internet advertising, television subscriptions, filmed entertainment and computer game sales.

PWC’s Bartley O’Connor said: “Over the five year period, a more important development than the recession for the E&M industry will be the acceleration of the migration to digital technologies and platforms, such as online communities and social networking sites.

“This change in consumer behaviour, and how they interact with and use content is leading to a fundamental change in advertising and business models.

“As audiences continue to fragment in the years ahead, we will see a structural change in the advertising world. A key challenge for traditional E&M businesses is to identify appropriate models for monetising their content in the digital world,” he added.

Regarding the outlook for the advertising market, he said: “The Irish advertising market is expected to fall by 13.7% in 2009 with a further decline of 4.5% in 2010.”