The Two Increasingly Dominant Business Models in Consumer Media

One of the most fascinating things about the consumer technology industry is the range of business models in evidence among the various companies. Though software may indeed be said to be eating the world, what’s fascinating to me is that almost no business models are based on selling software. Instead, we’re seeing the rise of two dominant business models in almost all of consumer digital media: subscriptions and advertising. And as these take over on the content side of the industry, they’re more likely to take increasing share of other parts of the industry including hardware as well.

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Jan Dawson

Jan Dawson is Founder and Chief Analyst at Jackdaw Research, a technology research and consulting firm focused on consumer technology. During his sixteen years as a technology analyst, Jan has covered everything from DSL to LTE, and from policy and regulation to smartphones and tablets. As such, he brings a unique perspective to the consumer technology space, pulling together insights on communications and content services, device hardware and software, and online services to provide big-picture market analysis and strategic advice to his clients. Jan has worked with many of the world’s largest operators, device and infrastructure vendors, online service providers and others to shape their strategies and help them understand the market. Prior to founding Jackdaw, Jan worked at Ovum for a number of years, most recently as Chief Telecoms Analyst, responsible for Ovum’s telecoms research agenda globally.