Top 50 OTT Platforms 2018 Ricardo Seguin Guise What’s Inside... Publisher Anna Carugati Introduction 3 Group Editorial Director Regional Focus: Europe 7 Mansha Daswani Regional Focus: Asia 8 Regional Focus: Latin America 10 Editor Regional Focus: MEA 11 Genre Focus: Kids’ Programming 12 Kristin Brzoznowski Genre Focus: Drama 15 Executive Editor Acorn TV 18 Amazon Prime Video 19 Joanna Padovano Tong Ameba TV 22 Managing Editor Azoomee 23 BritBox 25 Sara Alessi CHILI 26 Associate Editor Claro video 27 CraveTV 28 Victor L. Cuevas Crunchyroll 30 Production and Design Director CuriosityStream 31 DramaFever 33 Simon Weaver Flimmit 34 Online Director HOOQ 36 Hopster 38 Dana Mattison Hulu 39 Senior Sales and Marketing Manager Hulu Japan 41 iclix 43 Nathalia Lopez ilix 45 iQiyi 48 Sales and Marketing Assistant Ivi.ru 50 Andrea Moreno Lightbox 51 maxdome 52 Business Affairs Manager MEGOGO 53 MUBI 54 Netlix 55 Pickbox 62 PlayKids 63 Pluto TV 64 Pongalo 65 QubitTV 66 Ricardo Seguin Guise Rakuten TV 67 Showmax 68 President Shudder 70 Anna Carugati Sohu 72 Stan 73 Executive VP STARZ Play 74 Mansha Daswani Sundance Now 75 Tencent 76 Associate Publisher and tonton 78 VP of Strategic Development Tribe 79 Tubi TV 80 Viaplay 81 World Screen Special Reports Videoland 83 © 2018 WSN INC. Viewster 84 Viu 85 1123 Broadway, #1207 Vonetize 86 New York, NY 10010, U.S.A. Walter Presents 87 XiveTV 89 Phone: (212) 924-7620 Youku 90 Fax: (212) 924-6940 YouTube 91 No part of this publication can This report is for individual use only. be used, reprinted, copied or stored in any medium without the Dissemination to others is strictly prohibited. publisher’s authorization. For a free subscription to ALL SALES ARE FINAL 2 our newsletters, please visit www.subscriptions.ws Introduction In the two years since World Screen ’s first Top 50 OTT Plat forms report, the landscape has radically transformed. Netflix and Amazon are both now global, exerting their in - fluence to varying degrees around the world. New players have emerged, some catering to niches, others looking to be general-entertainment players serving every member of a household. Many platforms didn’t make it, among them Shomi in Canada, Watchever in Germany and Presto in Aus tralia. Others are having to refocus as they struggle to sign up members and access the best product—there are, after all, plenty of linear platforms able to shell out the cash for first- runs and are increasingly taking on multiplatform rights as they extend their own services to the online space.
Demand is strong for online viewing across the globe, with Digital TV Research projecting almost 600 million SVOD customers worldwide by 2022. In this report you’ll find profiles of 50 of the leading digital platforms around the world, operating across the SVOD, AVOD and TVOD landscapes. Dedicated SVOD services are largely paying a standard license fee. Ad-supported platforms offer revenue shares and/or license fees, depending on the content. While some are still doing large volume deals as they focus on building significant libraries for their cus tomers, many are shifting their em phasis to doing deals for high-profile indi - vidual titles, as well as dipping their toes into the original programming space. Going forward, a major challenge for platforms will be data mining and user interfaces as consumers become befuddled with the sheer volume of choices available. According to PwC, 62 percent of consumers have a hard time finding something to watch, and 55 percent are looking for a new TV show or movie at least once a week.
“Entertainment and media companies have long competed on two dimensions: content and distribution,” PwC states. “To thrive in today’s increasingly competitive, crowded, slow-growth marketplace, however, they must focus on a third dimension: user experience. This industry shift favors the consumer, forcing content providers, media distributors,
Top 50 OTT Platforms 3 and tech companies to improve the discovery, personaliza - tion and ‘stickiness’ of their content. Flooded by options from an ever-growing library of video content, consumers are struggling to find what they want. Add in a rapidly grow - ing, fragmented marketplace of distribution platforms, and we’re left with a consumer that’s overwhelmed, and ‘A’ con - tent that’s left undiscovered and unwatched.” PwC identifies three goals for companies operating in this environment: attract as many audiences as possible and keep them “satisfied and engaged;” justify increasing content production and acquisition costs; and deliver a return on in vestment for advertisers. “Often, consumers don’t know what they want to watch before sitting down, and they frequently discover content freely without any previous knowledge or recommenda - tions from people they know,” the report continues. Con - sumers spend almost as much time watching newly discovered content as they do shows or movies they’ve al - ready heard about. The survey also found that 42 percent of viewing time is on content found by chance by brows - ing versus 58 percent on something they already knew they wanted to watch. “For the majority of consumers, trying to find that special something to watch has proven challenging—and annoying. Nearly two-thirds of consumers agree that they often strug - gle to find something to watch, despite there being many choices available to them.” PwC goes on to note that personalized recommendation is the holy grail of content discovery, but “‘Top picks for me’ falls short.” Among pay-TV subs, the biggest influence on what to watch is previous knowledge—such as viewing a series based on a book you’re familiar with—followed by chan - nel surfing, advertising, a recommendation from some - one you know, the “popular” list on a streaming service and lastly the “Top picks for me” on a streaming service. Among non-pay TV streamers, topping the list is the “Popular” category on an OTT platform, followed by the “Recently released” tab, a recommendation from some - one you know, “Top picks for me,” previous knowledge and then channel surfing.
Top 50 OTT Platforms 4 CuriosityStream PROFILE: Features 1,500 hours of science, history, tech and nature documentaries. Launched in 2015 by John Hen dricks, the founder of Discovery Communications, the service is now available in 196 countries worldwide. Its top category is science, followed by history and then shows about space.
“Every show does not have to appeal to a broad audience,” says Steve Burns, chief programming officer. “You have this broad selection. So I’ve taken chances on shows that I would never have done on television, because it wouldn’t have enough viewers that were interested in it to produce big rat ings. You want to provide for niche audiences, and they don’t have to watch every single show, they just have to watch the ones that they love.”
REVENUE MODEL: SVOD.
ACQUISITIONS STRATEGY: “Most topics have been done, but because science is always evolving and changing, we can revisit topics. So we look for those new in sights in history and science, and we also look for production values. Story - telling techniques change and storytelling styles change, so we look for things that will appeal to people who are super curious about their world, about space and science and his - tory and technology and wildlife. There is no formula. It’s a combination of the person’s experience, the filmmakers’ experience, plus passion, plus knowledge of what’s al - ready in our inventory. And for me it’s always about in - sight and innovation.”
ORIGINALS STRATEGY: Deep Time History , from Flight 33, has been among the platform’s original programming successes. The service also commissioned Space Probes , consisting of eight 20-minute episodes.
CONTACT: Purchase the full report for key intel on CuriosityStream and 49 other platforms.
Top 50 OTT Platforms 5