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Report: EC piracy recommendation‘ no impact’

News

Vodafone, AST SpaceMobile European JV

Vodafone and AST SpaceMobile, which is building a space-based cellular broadband network, have signed an agreement to create a jointly-owned European satellite service business( SatCo) to serve mobile network operators( MNOs) in all European markets.

SatCo will seek to provide 100 % geographic coverage in every part of Europe to give consumers and businesses access to secure space-based cellular broadband connectivity via their MNO.
The new venture will exclusively distribute AST SpaceMobile’ s satellite services to European MNOs under a single turnkey arrangement. This will be underpinned by a full network management and network operations centre capability, based in Europe, drawing on Vodafone’ s advanced engineering expertise. SatCo will build and run a network of ground stations to provide backhaul services from these MNOs across Europe to the satellite network in low Earth orbit.
SatCo’ s solution will fully support European digital sovereignty. AST SpaceMobile’ s satellites already operate as remote radio heads where the core network capability remains with the MNO. SatCo builds on this by providing fully sovereign backhaul capabilities under Vodafone co-ownership, with European headquarters and management.
“ Vodafone’ s space-based mobile broadband
“ Vodafone’ s space-based mobile broadband will mean our customers can stay connected, wherever they are.” will mean our customers can stay connected, wherever they are,” commented Margherita Della Valle, Vodafone Group CEO.“ Our new satellite company will be able to offer this pioneering technology to other European mobile operators through a turnkey service that combines Vodafone’ s leading network and engineering with AST SpaceMobile’ s‘ antennas in the sky’.”
“ Together with Vodafone, we are poised to accelerate our commercialisation plans across all of Europe, making true mobile broadband from space a reality,” added Abel Avellan, founder, chairman and CEO of AST SpaceMobile.
On January 27th 2025, Vodafone successfully made the world’ s first space-based mobile video call from an area without any mobile coverage on the recently launched BlueBirds satellites, supporting the company’ s aim to provide ubiquitous mobile coverage for its 340 million customers in 15 countries and its network partners in 45 more markets.
Operating from low Earth orbit, AST SpaceMobile will offer mobile broadband directly to multiple 4G or 5G smartphones without the need of any specialised software or device support or updates, working seamlessly as an extension of Vodafone’ s land-based networks.
In support of its European expansion, AST SpaceMobile is also enhancing its presence in Spain with the recent opening of 5,600 square meters of manufacturing and office space in Barcelona.
These strategic initiatives will enhance AST SpaceMobile’ s capabilities to serve the European market by increasing production capacity and accelerating the rigorous testing of its satellite and telecommunications systems.

Report: EC piracy recommendation‘ no impact’

The second report published by Grant Thornton, carried out in partnership with the Live Content Coalition- a group of representatives of leading European live content producers, broadcasters and exhibitors- demonstrates no discernible impact of the European Commission’ s Recommendation of May 4th 2023 on combating of sports and other live events. It clearly indicates that the situation continues to deteriorate for live events organisers, broadcasters and workers alike.

The analysis covers the full year’ s data for 2024 and includes a comparison with Grant Thornton’ s previous analysis covering only the first half of 2024. Key findings:
• 10.8m takedown notices relating to unauthorised retransmission of live events were submitted to
intermediaries.
• Over 81 % of these notices did not result in suspension of the illegal retransmission.
• Only 2.7 % of infringements were acted upon within 30 minutes and 20 % took over 120 minutes for action.
• Dedicated Server Providers received more notices requesting the suspension of retransmissions than Online Platforms and other hosting providers combined, accounting for 52 % of all notices submitted across 2024. Eighty-nine per cent of these notices did not lead to suspension of the illegal retransmission.
• Regarding cooperation agreements, the analysis shows that of the notices submitted based on such agreements 86 % were directed to online platforms. These have an 84 % effectiveness
in achieving suspension. Of the notices submitted to Dedicated Server Providers, only 1 % were submitted in line with a cooperation agreement. While cooperation agreements can help improve the likelihood of suspensions when correctly implemented, for Dedicated Server Providers complementary measures are needed. Grant Thornton will continue to monitor the impact of the European Commission’ s Recommendation on piracy of live events. The third edition of the analysis will be released in Q3 2025 reporting on key trends during the year and will offer a comprehensive view of progress through year on-year analysis.
“ The latest Grant Thornton report shows that piracy of live content is continuing at pace in Europe in spite of the Recommendation,” commented
Mark Lichtenhein, chair of the Sports Rights Owners Coalition, and Grégoire Polad, director general, Association of Commercial Television and Video on Demand Services in Europe.“ European broadcasters, sports leagues and other players in the live events environment work tirelessly to protect content from theft. Current measures are clearly not working, whilst technological advances are making piracy easier and more lucrative than ever for criminals. We once again call on the Commission to urgently bring forward legislation requiring the intermediaries, protected by safe harbour provisions, to remove infringing content within the live window, when notified. Organised crime remains the sole beneficiary of this legislative inaction, and it is imperative that we protect the survival of the live events sector in Europe.”
6 EUROMEDIA