Across many countries, governments are grappling with the same fundamental question: how do you ensure that global streaming platforms contribute meaningfully to local screen industries? Investment obligations. Levies. Quota requirements. Rights retention rules. The policy toolkit is growing — but approaches, attitudes and outcomes vary enormously.

Our research looks at how these different regulatory approaches are playing out in practice, what’s driving local independent film and TV production, and where the gaps remain. At a time when the European Commission is actively reviewing the Audiovisual Media Services Directive, the findings couldn’t be more timely.

A few things that struck us:
• The same policy instrument can have very different effects depending on market context
• Effects are complex and depend on the interplay of commercial objectives and regulatory obligations
• Rights retention may be an underappreciated lever in the whole debate

Read the full report here.

Ireland’s electricity grid market is evolving to operate with up to 80% renewable electricity. This requires adequate supply of system stability services. Ireland has been moving ahead on the design and implementation of competitive procurement of reserve services, where DotEcon has assisted with the design and implementation of new auctions. However, system stability also requires more complex non-reserve services, such as reactive power and inertia.

Our latest report for EirGrid Group and SONI – System Operator for Northern Ireland explores current incentives for supply of these non-reserve services through regulated payments for these services that modulate suppliers’ energy offers. We find there are no clear gains from removing these payments in the interim period; doing so may even lead to higher overall costs by forcing more expensive, non-energy actions to maintain system stability. We also consider outline long-term options for procurement of non-reserve services that might eventually replace current regulated tariffs.

To find out more, see download our report here and see our other work for EirGrid/SONI here.

In the Swedish 1800 MHz auction, completed in November 2025, half of the available spectrum in the band for which current licences expire in 2027 was offered. All three existing licensees took part, but only two won spectrum. As a result, the band is now evenly split between Telia and N4M with Tre not having any 1800 MHz spectrum.

We interpret these results with regard to the questions regulators consider when faced with expiring licences:

1. What are the trade-offs between running an auction and simply renewing licences to previous licensees?
2. Do operators wish to hold spectrum in every band in order to operate efficiently?
3. How much do operators value contiguous spectrum assignments?

See our thoughts here.

Offshore wind is an important contributor to global energy generation, and many countries are running offshore wind farm tenders or are planning to do so. Although interest in new developing new capacity has been cooling recently in the face of higher long-term interest rates and potential supply chain concerns, offshore wind is still expected to grow strongly over the coming years.

We have taken a step back to look at the design of the processes used for allocating offshore wind farm permits. In this paper we discuss two key questions. First, what are the relative merits of running separate tenders for subsidies and access to the seabed? And second, why don’t we see more open auctions in this sector?

Parachute payments – an arrangement under which clubs relegated from the Premier League (PL), for example, continue to share some of the PL’s substantive broadcasting revenues for a few years – have been the source of a long-running disagreement between the PL and the English Football League (EFL). Resolving this dispute will likely be one of the tasks of the forthcoming Independent Football Regulator (IFR).

The IFR is meant to act as an arbitrator, with the final stage (if it comes to it) being a pendulum arbitration process. In this process, the arbitrator can only accept one or the other (or none) of the proposals submitted by the parties but cannot come up with its own compromise solution. This should give both sides an incentive to come up with reasonable suggestions. However, it works well only if the criteria that the arbitrator will use are clear and well understood. We question whether this is the case here given that the IFR’s objectives have been defined in rather vague terms. The IFR will very likely need to clarify these objectives and thus take on a role that goes beyond purely being an arbitrator. See our thoughts here.

The GSMA has declared 2025 to be ‘The Year of Spectrum Renewals’. While licensees understandably argue for an extension or automatic re-assignment, there are good reasons for not dismissing competitive procedures. Benefits from supporting adjustments to spectrum holding suggest using a hybrid approach.

See this paper for more details.