Few key things happened around the Ad Tech & Media Tech world this week.
Disney’s new MCU series got 495 million minutes of streaming in one week
After the success of the Disney+ series, The Falcon and the Winter Soldier which Marvel regarded as the best debut of original series, now Nielsen has come out with good numbers regarding show performance. As per the firm, the new series got hit with 495 million minutes of viewing time when its premiere episode came out in the mid of March. Adding to it, Wanda Vision got 434 million streaming time in the same week. It also excelled both the season one and two premieres of The Mandalorian. Netflix’s Ginny and Georgia with 540 million minutes viewed that same week if we say, the original series that can compete with Disney+ The Falcon and the Winter Soldier. It seems like a knock against Marvel’s latest live-action series. Netflix has a more subscriber base than Disney + and it also released Ginny and Georgia’s entire season content all at once. When we look into these factors, the numbers created by The Falcon and the Winter Soldier are appreciating. As more people are signing up for Disney+ service every season looking for more Marvel content especially Black Widow and Loki which is yet to come, that day is no longer for Disney to beat its own record.
Live Sports – A New front has opened up in the streaming wars
Streaming on sports activities never outpaced Movies or web series in the streaming services across the globe. However, consumers are these days want Live sports on their streaming programs. Due to technical or financial constraints, streaming services across the globe have neglected sports events. “Sports [are] kind of the last bastion of the linear television model,” says Geetha Ranganathan, a media analyst at Bloomberg Intelligence. But now the trend is showing slightly positive towards sports and here is the positive news. Amazon has recently secured all the rights to air the 15 Thursday night football games as part of its Prime service, starting the 2023 season. Amazon has won the same service in 2017 to show the Thursday games, costing $50M for one year. But the new deal is approximately valued at around $1 billion annually.
OTT Overtakes Linear TV on Global Stage, MiQ Reports
OTT is now the leading source for watching TV and movies across the globe, according to a new report from MiQ. It took nearly a year into the pandemic, but OTT overtook traditional linear TV in the last couple of months of 2020, where practically all of the 2.2 million households that MiQ tracked for the report had an active OTT use based on normalized index (averaged consumption across households tuning in at least once over 45 days and a greater than 15 minute viewing time). The data comes from MiQ’s “A Year of Lockdowns” report. At the start of 2020, about 90% of global households were active linear TV households, while OTT was active in a little more than 80%, per MiQ. Those numbers actually dipped in February 2020 until spiking in the first two months of pandemic (March and April). In April, nearly 100% of households had active linear TV accounts; OTT rose to about 90%. In the summer months, after initial lockdown orders began to lift, active household numbers dropped for both linear TV and OTT, reaching lows in July. However, starting in August, things started to pick back up again. OTT saw rapid, exponential growth, going from around 70% in July to nearly 100% of global households in November; that number stayed flat in December. As for linear TV, it’s numbers increased more slowly through November, where it held at about the mid 90% range, before dropping again in December. Not only did OTT surpass linear TV in active households in November, it also saw people spending more time watching it…More
Plex raises $50M growth round to fuel ad-supported streaming, expansions
Streaming media software maker Plex announced today it has raised a $50 million growth equity round from existing investor Intercap ahead of its planned business expansion into rentals, purchases and subscription content. This is the first financing Plex has taken on since 2014 and is being partly used to purchase shares and options from Plex’s early seed investors and shareholders from prior acquisitions, and to give the company’s earliest employees a bit of liquidity. Of the $50 million raised, $15 million will be put to work as new growth capital. The company declined to disclose its valuation as a result of the funding — technically Plex’s Series C — but says it resulted in a relatively low dilution for its existing investors who have stayed in, including Kleiner Perkins and Nexstar, for example. Meanwhile, some of its earliest investors were able to get a 10x return or greater on their shares. As part of the round, Intercap chairman and CEO Jason Chapnik joined the board of directors as chairman, and Intercap president James Merkur also joined the board. Including this financing, Plex has raised more than $60 million. To date, Plex has been cautious about fundraising because, as Plex CEO Keith Valory says, “we really hadn’t had to.” That is, the company has been profitable on its own…More
India’s ‘streaming dream’ may dim with new digital regulations
When major companies like Amazon and Netflix fixed their attention on India, it seemed like a match made in heaven for filmmakers. The two platforms invested heavily in India’s booming streaming market — buoyed by cheap internet on smartphones. Streaming platforms in India offered an escape from the tyranny of the opening weekend box office numbers and censorship rules that hem in mainstream Indian cinema and TV. But that brief spring of contentment might end soon. The Indian government is bringing online news outlets and streaming platforms under the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting. The shift could usher in new layers of bureaucracy, regulation and censorship when it comes to creating online content in India. Filmmakers and storytellers like Hansal Mehta were excited when, in 2018, Netflix released “Sacred Games,” its first Indian original, made in Hindi, based on a 900-plus page English novel from 2006 about gangsters and cops on a race against time to save Mumbai. Mehta said it opened up “the prospect of being able to tell stories that don’t necessarily fit into a mainstream format.” He felt like all of a sudden, a “Breaking Bad” kind of show was possible in India. “Sacred Games” took on religion, sexuality, politics and gender more frankly than usual. Film critic Raja Sen wrote, “We finally have an Indian series to binge and quote and argue over, and hasn’t that been our streaming dream?” Other series quickly followed: “Inside Edge,” a cricket and crime drama; “The Family Man,” about a terrorist attack; “Made In Heaven,” a series about big, fat Indian weddings with a gay lead. Now, with new regulatory oversight, India’s “streaming dream” may be dimmed…More
