Despite intensifying concerns about declining DVD sales, boxoffice receipts and advertiser spending, traditional media executives attending Herbert Allen's exclusive Sun Valley summit this month didn't exactly flock to the so-called new media moguls, whose emerging venues could be critical in offsetting the industry's mounting economic risks. That uniform observation from elite executive conference attendees begs the question: "Why not?" When presented with the opportunity to aggressively explore viable new alternatives to their challenged business models, why didn't traditional media players respond as if their existence depends on it, as suggested by a recent flood of troubling statistics? "There was almost no interaction between traditional media companies and new media companies," one high-level Sun Valley conference attendee says. "Google was talking about video search and Intel talked about WiMax, and all the new media companies were talking about changing the existing business models. The traditional media companies sat there and listened to them with their heads in the sand, like it's business as usual," another conference attendee says. "It was really bizarre."
The global smartphone market closed 2025 with a story less about recovery and more about transformation. Premium product, ecosystem lock-in, and manufacturing scale are now the forces shaping competition. For business and technology leaders, the latest IDC market study data confirms that smartphones remain a critical indicator of consumer demand, supply chain health, and AI commercialization at the edge. Smartphone Market Development Global smartphone shipments grew 2.3 percent year-over-year in Q4 2025, reaching 336.3 million units and bringing full-year volumes to 1.26 billion units — a modest 1.9 percent annual increase, according to IDC. This smartphone growth emerged despite a memory shortage crisis, tariff volatility, supply chain disruption, and macroeconomic headwinds. What stabilized demand? Two factors: sustained growth in premium devices and strong foldable momentum, combined with accelerated purchases as consumers bought ahead of anticipated price increases. Buyers weren...