Big Tech companies dominate the social media space. Meta’s Facebook has 3 billion monthly active users (MAUs), accounting for 61% of the global online population, and Google’s YouTube has approximately 2.7 billion MAUs. In most segments, platforms have benefited from network effects, and thanks to their high volume of users, they are the most attractive to both consumers and advertisers. Few players offer a portfolio of services comparable to Meta, preferring instead to offer more specialized services. For example, LinkedIn positions itself as a social media platform for consumers’ professional networks.
Several smaller social networks, such as BlueSky, Damus, and Mastodon, have entered the market following regulatory scrutiny of large social media companies’ business practices and users’ desire for more intimate engagement. The scrutiny has seen the UK launch an investigation into Google’s dominance in adtech, and the EU Commission launched an investigation into Apple and Microsoft. The regulatory crackdown on monopolistic behavior means the super-app model pioneered by Tencent in China is unlikely to be as successful in the West. Consumer demand will also impact attempts to build pools of connected apps, such as Elon Musk’s bid to transform X (formerly Twitter) into a super-app to diversify revenue streams away from personalized ads. Consumers’ increased concern about the use of personal data and content moderation will instead see smaller decentralized apps (dApps) become more popular.
Key Highlights
Social media companies will increasingly diversify away from their ad-funded business model in the face of increased regulatory scrutiny. In 2023 alone, Alphabet, Amazon, ByteDance, and Meta were fined a combined $7.7 billion for breaching data privacy laws over their ad-targeting practices. Regulators have also accused them of monopolistic behavior around access to personal data. In 2023, Alphabet, ByteDance, Meta, and Microsoft were classified as “gatekeepers” under the EU’s latest antitrust legislation.Several smaller social networks, such as BlueSky, Damus, and Mastodon, have entered the market following regulatory scrutiny of large social media companies’ business practices and users’ desire for more intimate engagement. The scrutiny has seen the UK launch an investigation into Google’s dominance in adtech, and the EU Commission launched an investigation into Apple and Microsoft. The regulatory crackdown on monopolistic behavior means the super-app model pioneered by Tencent in China is unlikely to be as successful in the West. Consumer demand will also impact attempts to build pools of connected apps, such as Elon Musk’s bid to transform X (formerly Twitter) into a super-app to diversify revenue streams away from personalized ads. Consumers’ increased concern about the use of personal data and content moderation will instead see smaller decentralized apps (dApps) become more popular.
Scope
- This report provides an overview of the social media theme.
- It identifies the key trends impacting the growth of the theme over the next 12 to 24 months, split into three categories: technology trends, macroeconomic trends, and regulatory trends.
- It contains details of M&A deals driven by the social media theme and a timeline highlighting milestones in the development of social media.
- The detailed value chain comprises five layers: content, distribution, data, services, and customer. Leading and challenging vendors are identified across all five layers.
Reasons to Buy
- The report identifies six main categories of social media players (social networks, discussion forums, media sharing sites, consumer review networks, sharing economy companies, and messaging services) and highlights leading and challenging companies across all six categories.
- It also analyzes Big Tech's presence in the social media sector. In most segments, big platforms benefit from network effects, and, thanks to their larger number of users, they are the most attractive to consumers and advertisers. However, smaller networks are gaining popularity due to user concerns about data privacy and content moderation.
Table of Contents
- Executive Summary
- Players
- Thematic Briefing
- Trends
- Signals
- Value Chain
- Companies
- Sector Scorecard
- Glossary
- Further Reading
- Thematic Research Methodology
Companies Mentioned (Partial List)
A selection of companies mentioned in this report includes, but is not limited to:
- Ab Initio
- AccelData
- Adetiq
- Adknowledge
- Ahewar
- Airbnb
- Airbyte
- Alation
- Alibaba
- Alphabet
- Alteryx
- Altibase
- Amazon
- AMC Networks
- Amundsen
- Anyscale
- Apache Foundation
- Apple
- Astronomer
- Ataccama
- Atlan
- Attivio
- AvantLink
- Avis Budget Group
- Baidu
- BBC
- BeReal
- Bigeye
- BlaBlaCar
- Bluesky
- BMC Software
- Bolt
- Booking.com
- Boomi
- Broadcom
- ByteDance
- CData
- CEDQ
- Celigo
- Census
- Check Point Software
- Cisco
- CJ Affiliate
- ClickHouse
- Cloud Software Group
- Cloudera
- Cohesity
- Colibra
- Comcast
- Common Room
- Confluent
- Couchbase
- Criterio
- CrowdStrike
- Cyclr
- Damco Group
- Damus
- Darktrace
- Dask
- Data Virtuality
- data.world
- Databricks
- DataCaptive
- DataHub
- Dataiku
- DataStax
- DataTorrent
- DataVirtuality
- Dbt Labs
- Degreed
- Dell Technologies
- Delphix
- Delta Lake
- DeNa
- Denodo Technologies
- DesignerShare
- Digital Point
- Discord
- Disney
- Domo
- Dremio
- Eastern Jin Tech
- Ebay
- eFuse
- Elementl
- EnterpriseDB
- Epic Games
- Epom
- Exasol
- Experian
- Feefo
- FireEye
- FlexOffers
- Flink
- Flinkster
- Forcepoint
- Fortinet
- Foursquare
- Fox Corp
- Fujitsu
- GameSpot
- Gaming Buddy
- Getfeedback
- Glassdoor
- GoFundMe
- Gojek
- Grab
- Great Expectations
- Gree
- Groupon
- HackerNews
- HalloApp
- HCL Technologies
- Helpsystems
- Hightouch
- Hitachi
- Hive
- HPE
- Huawei
- Hubski
- IBM
- Immuta
- Imply
- India Forums
- Informatica
- Information Builders
- Insource
- Instant Bloomberg
- Intel
- Intenda
- ITV
- Jitterbit
- Judy's Book
- Kakao
- KasKus
- Keboola
- KickStarter
- Kik
- Kuaishou
- Lark Technologies
- Lemmy
- Line
- Lionsgate
- Locket
- LookML
- Lyft
- Mail.ru
- Make
- MariaDB
- MarkLogic
- Mastodon
- Materialize
- Matillion
- MediaLab AI
- Meta
- Microsoft
- Mixi
- Momo
- MongoDB
- Monte Carlo
- Naver
- NC Soft
- NetApp
- Netflix
- New Work
- News Corp
- Nikkei
- nMedia
- Nostr
- NuoDB
- Nutanix
- Nvidia
- Okta
- Oracle
- Outsourcely
- Ovaledge
- Palantir
- Palo Alto Networks
- Pandas
- Panoply
- Paramount Global
- PayPal
- PDD Holdings
- Percona
- Plato Team
- Pollywork
- PostgreSQL
- Precisely
- Prefect
- Privacera
- Profisee
- Progress Software
- Pulsar
- Pure Storage
- PyTorch
- Qlik
- Qualcomm
- Qubole
- Quora
- Rakuten (Viber)
- RapidMiner
- Redis Labs
- Renren
- Retalk
- Revenuewire
- Revolut
- Roblox
- Rockset
- S&P
- SaidIt
- Salesforce
- SAP
- SAS
- Scality
- Securonix
- ShareChat
- Shopify
- Signal
- Silent Phone
- Sina
- SingleStore
- Singtel
- Sitejabber
- Snap
- SnapLogici
- Snowflake
- Software AG
- Sogou
- Sony
- Sophos
- Splunk
- Stack Overflow
- Starburst
- Stibo Systems
- Stitch
- Stone Bond Technologies
- Stratio
- StreamSets
- Substack
- Supergrain
- Supermetrics
- Taboola
- Tabular
- Talend
- TalentGarden
- Talkatone
- TaskRabbit
- Telegram
- Tencent
- Teradata
- Tessian
- The New York Times
- Thomson Reuters
- Transwarp
- Tray.io
- Trellix
- Trend Micro
- TripAdvisor
- Trustpilot
- Uber
- Ucommune
- Uhive
- Upsolver
- uReview.me
- Valve
- Vdoo
- Veritas
- Viaplay
- VMware
- VoltDB
- Voxer
- Warner Bros. Discovery
- WeGroup
- WeWork
- Workato
- X
- XDA-Developers
- Xiaohongshu
- Yandex
- Yelp
- Yubo
- YY
- Z Holdings
- Zee Entertainment
- Zhihu
- Zomato
