Asia Pacific TV ad spend overtakes western Europe Growth

Asia Pacific TV ad spend overtakes western EuropeGrowth in India and China helped region become world's second biggest TV advertising market last year, report finds

TV advertising revenue in the Asia Pacific region overtook that in western Europe for the first time last year, as India and China grew and established markets suffered.

Total net TV advertising for Asia Pacific, minus factors including agency commission and client discounts, was $27.9bn (£19bn), according to a report from the media analysts Informa.

The value of the western European TV ad market was $26.7bn. North America remained by some margin the biggest TV ad market globally, at $38.9bn.

Earlier this week WPP chief executive Sir Martin Sorrell, addressing the International Advertising Association Conference in Moscow, said that the growth of advertising markets in Asia Pacific was a "shift geographically that is extremely fundamental to us". He added that while the US had seen a strong recovery this year the situation in Europe remained "depressing".

Western Europe had been expected to stay ahead of the Asia Pacific region in terms of total ad revenue for several more years.

This was because of major sports events such as the London Olympics in 2012 and football World Cups in South Africa this year and Brazil in 2014 – both held in countries compatible with European time zones, and therefore attractive to TV advertisers.

However, Asia Pacific is now expected to stay ahead, although the gap between it and western Europe is forecast to narrow from more than $750m to $539m by 2012.

"There are very large markets such as India and there was no recession like we saw in western Europe," said Simon Murray, principal media analyst at Informa. "We did not expect Asia Pacific to pass western Europe until after 2012, and possibly even 2015, although if I had to say when it might have happened with no recession I'd say probably in 2013."

In 2009 TV ad spend in China grew by 9% year on year to about $4bn, while India saw growth of 9.5% to $1.06bn.

India was one of three countries in the region to pass the $1bn milestone last year as the Philippines experienced 12% year-on-year growth and Indonesia saw a 9.7% surge. And smaller countries, such as Vietnam, experienced dramatic growth of 20% year on year to $183m.

However, not every country in the region prospered: in Japan, which accounted for close to 50% of the region's TV advertising at $13.2bn, spend dropped 10% year on year.

Similarly, there was a 14% year-on-year fall in Korea; and Australia, despite having a recession-resilient economy, saw TV ad spend fall 8.5% year on year in 2009.

"Asia Pacific currently has a much lower ad spend per TV household figure of $40 [while western Europe is at $162 and North America at $303] and with many high population countries there is huge room for growth in total TV spend," said Murray.

By 2015 North America will remain the largest TV ad market, forecast to be worth $47bn, with Asia Pacific comfortably second on $34.4bn and western Europe on £33.6bn.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2010/may/14/global-tv-ad-revenue-informa