Analyst Insight: When Star Wars was released in the U.S. in 1977, China was a broken, impoverished, country reeling from the Cultural Revolution and seeking ways to rejoin the "Republic" of nations. To many Chinese alive at the time, the China of today must look much like the Star Wars universe looked 40 years ago to American moviegoers. Full of unimaginable technologies, bullet trains and jets whizzing people around and avant garde fashions replacing Mao suits. - Michael Zakkour, Vice President China/Asia Pacific Practice Leader, Tompkins International

Retail sales of recorded music will see little variation in total spending levels in the years to 2020 despite the rising interest in streaming, according to global analyst firm Ovum's latest forecasts. Spending on digital formats and services will overtake physical formats this year and go on to account for almost three-quarters of all sales in just six years.