Kagan Research releases financial rankings for over 100 cable networks -- according to the findings in a new Kagan databook entitled Benchmarking Cable Network Financial Statistics 2005 "Cable networks generated $26 billion in revenue during 2004. Over the past five years their revenue has grown at a CAGR of 11.2% per year despite the ad market meltdown. The cable network industry's average cash flow margin is 33.7%. But that average masks a large number of cash flow-negative networks. Not counting them, the average margin for healthy, established networks is greater than 40%. Ad revenue for the average network is 44% of the total, with affiliate revenue at 52%. It's no mystery why so many players seek entry into this lucrative sector."
Enterprise AI budgets are flowing in two directions at once, and only one of them builds an asset the buyer actually controls. Gartner's latest forecast puts worldwide AI spending at $2.7 trillion in 2026, but the composition of that figure matters far more than the total. Executives who read only the headline will miss the tension between what they are buying and what they actually own. The Number Behind the Number Gartner projects 2026 AI spending is a 49.5 percent increase over 2025, with $3.6 trillion forecast for 2027. AI infrastructure accounts for $1.5 trillion of this year's total, more than half. Gartner's John-David Lovelock calls the data center buildout the largest infrastructure project humanity has undertaken, and describes demand as inelastic even as memory prices climb. Compute Concentration is a Sovereignty Issue Gartner expects hyperscalers and service providers buying AI-optimized servers to remain the largest single area of spending. For an enterprise, t...