Posts for 'discovery+'

In this week’s podcast, Colin and I discuss Warner Bros. Discovery’s plan to launch a new streaming bundle in France dubbed “Warner Pass,” exclusively on Amazon Prime Channels, which Variety reported. Warner Pass will include all HBO content, plus 12 WBD channels including CNN, Discovery Channel, Eurosport and others.

The move caught our attention because WBD has been quite vocal about its intention to launch a combined HBO Max / discovery+ service (expected to be simply called “Max”), which the Variety report noted it still plans to introduce in France in 2024.

Colin and I think Warner Pass could offer clues about how WBD will price the combined service eventually (especially in Europe). Yet it raises a concern that having two different streaming brands in France with similar content is clumsy and could cause consumer confusion (not to mention spending required to support two streaming brands).

Further, as we discussed in December, Warner Pass is yet another step in reversing the company’s strategy on third-party distribution. Prior WarnerMedia management decided to pull HBO from Amazon Prime Channels and others in September, 2021. As I wrote back then, in a direct-to-consumer world, not owning the subscriber, nor seeing their detailed viewing data, are real drawbacks.

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This week Colin and I discuss the future integration of Discovery+ and HBO Max. New details were shared this week by the company’s chief financial officer at an industry conference. Specifically, Colin sees strong upside in a discounted bundle of the streaming services and the eventual integration of their respective technology platforms the CFO described. However, he’s skeptical of an eventual plan to actually merge the services. We discuss the pros and cons.

Separate, we dig into a new test by Netflix to potentially charge subscribers an extra fee for out-of-house users.

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Welcome to this week’s edition of Inside the Stream, the podcast where nScreenMedia’s Chief Analyst Colin Dixon and I take listeners inside the world of streaming video.

This year people used more streaming services and more of them were free and ad-supported. Many more of us did without pay-TV. And discovery+ is one example of a streaming service that thrived since broadly launching. On this week’s podcast Colin shares four data points that illustrate each of these trends.

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The U.S. SVOD market has undergone significant fragmentation over the past two years as new services have launched, according to the Q1 2021 Growth Report from Antenna, an SVOD insights provider. In Q1 ’19, Netflix and Hulu together accounted for over three-quarters (78%) of all SVOD subscriptions. But two years later, in Q1 ’21, their combined share fell to just over half (51%), with Disney taking 17%, HBO Max 11%, Paramount+ 7%, Starz 6%, Showtime 4% and discovery+, Peacock and Apple TV+ all at 2%.

Antenna didn’t report Amazon Prime Video numbers. Amazon said in its Q1 ’21 earnings report that 175 million Prime members have streamed TV shows and movies in the past year, though it didn’t provide any breakdown of U.S. share vs. rest of world.

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Welcome to the 551st edition of the VideoNuze podcast, with my weekly partner Colin Dixon of nScreenMedia.

Vizio filed to go public this week and it’s looking to take a page out of Roku’s playbook. Vizio’s business is dominated by sales of TV sets today, but it wants to ramp up its Platform Plus segment which includes its advertising and data business. Colin and I discuss the opportunity and also what challenges Vizio will face (note, this is not investment advice).

Switching topics, discovery+ accounted for 19% of SVOD signups in the U.S. in January, marking a very strong start for the new streaming service. Looking ahead, we explore whether discovery+ will be able to maintain this pace, and also retain these new subscribers.
 

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discovery+ accounted for 19% share of US SVOD signups in January according to new data released by ANTENNA, a subscription insights provider. That put discovery+ at the top of the SVOD market, ahead of HBO Max (14%), Disney+ (13%) and Hulu and CBS All Access (each with 11%).

discovery+ launched on January 4th in the U.S. and recently estimated it would have 12 million paying subscribers at the end of February, including 7 million paying in the U.S. discovery+ made a content-rich debut with 55K TV episodes, more than are available on Netflix, Disney+, Peacock and HBO Max. discovery+ also plans to add 1,000 hours of original content this year.

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Happy New Year and welcome to a new year of the VideoNuze podcast, with my weekly partner Colin Dixon of nScreenMedia.  

Roku continues to grow, announcing over 50 million active accounts at the end of 2020. On this week’s podcast Colin and I dig into the data that Roku revealed.

The explosion of premium content for streaming no doubt is helping Roku’s account growth and viewership. A recent entrant is Discovery+ and Colin shares his initial review of the service, including a few surprising limitations he found.

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I’m pleased to present the 540th edition of the VideoNuze podcast, with my weekly partner Colin Dixon of nScreenMedia.  

discovery+ is set to launch in the U.S. on January 4th and on this week’s podcast Colin and I share our thoughts on why we’re optimistic about the service, especially in international markets where live sports will be included. We both like the service’s positioning as a complement to major SVOD providers, mainly by focusing on unscripted content.  

Before we get into discovery+, Colin provides some highlights from his new “Making Screen Time Family Time” report which revealed viewing behavior for families with kids under the age of 12. Colin notes the data around co-viewing, especially on weekday mornings.

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Discovery announced its discovery+ streaming service today, with a U.S. launch date of January 4th. There will be an ad-light version for $4.99 per month and an ad-free version for $6.99 per month. The service will roll out in 25 additional countries initially, at localized price points and with different packaging options. The first advertising partners announced include Boston Beer Company, Kraft Heinz, Lowe’s and Toyota.

Verizon will offer new and existing Play More and Get More Unlimited subscribers 12 months free of discovery+. Verizon will give Start and Do More Unlimited subscribers 6 months of discovery+. And new Verizon 5G Home Internet or Fios Gigabit Connection subscribers will also receive 12 months of free discovery+. Verizon offered similar free access to Disney+ at launch (and later the bundle with Hulu and ESPN+) which proved highly effective, driving an estimated 15% of Disney+’s first year subscribers.

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