Think Globally: SVOD Success Means More Content, Foreign Content and Automated Versioning

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Today there are nearly 300 VOD and OTT platforms available to consumers across more than 200 countries and territories. That number is expected to increase to 600 platforms and two billion subscribers by 2025. How do you stand out amid all that competition?

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“Content is king,” says Teresa Phillips, CEO and co-founder of data and technology company Spherex.

“Companies with existing or expanding content catalogs have a competitive advantage because they don’t have to buy or license content, but even those titles become stale over time,” she says.

“The result is the demand for new content will continue to increase as more consumers tire of existing catalogs, are unable to find something to watch, and reach the point of deciding which service is no longer worth the subscription price.

That leads to a prediction — which is surely already in action among most leading SVODs — that investment in original foreign-language content investment pays dividends.

The success of shows like South Korea drama Squid Game has platforms searching for possible successors. Netflix alone is investing half a billion dollars in Korean content in 2022. This year, Disney plans to launch service in South Korea, Taiwan, and Hong Kong and buy 50 Asian originals by 2023.

Meanwhile Peacock has partnered with Telemundo to develop 50 Spanish-language projects and create a new streaming channel, and Amazon Prime Video announced it is expanding its content development in India, ordering shows in Hindi, Tamil, and Telugu languages.

Several of these will find the same level of success and audience acceptance as Squid Game, Parasite, and other foreign language titles, says Phillips.

As the number of titles being released continues to increase, directors, producers, and studios need to find a competitive advantage that allows them to reach markets faster, at reduced cost and with no regulatory risk.

“Beginning in 2022, adding AI and ML tools to existing manual processes can help content providers accomplish this important objective while reducing localization costs and improving the customer experience, and getting to revenue faster,” Phillips says.