Streaming Media
Although the U.S
market leads the world in terms of ad supported premium content streaming
services, Warner Bros. Discovery (WBD) believes the European market
is primed to explode.
article here
“We call it
‘ad-lite’ and it’s a massive growth opportunity across the industry in EMEA,”
Leah Hooper Rosa, the company’s European Head of Streaming, said in a
conference session at IBC in Amsterdam.
She characterized
ad-lite as being of the order of 4-6 minutes of ads per hour rather than the
12-16 minutes per hour for typical FAST channels.
WBD has already
launched an ad-lite version of Discovery+ in Germany, with more
territories planned for rollout. Disney+ ad-supported service lands
in November.
“It’s a really
interesting business model for select markets. I think there will be an
increase in ad-lite propositions across Europe and with that we hope to see an
increase in the number of SVODs that households are taking,” Hooper Rosa said.
“The European average is still under three SVODs per household [versus
five in the U.S]. We hope that with the introduction of more lower-priced ad
services we get less switching behavior between services and customers begin
taking a broader sweep of streaming choices.”
She stressed the
need to focus on getting the right ad product experience for European audiences
bred on public service broadcasts. “You can’t just jam ads into every piece of
content,” she said. “You need to tailor the ad product.”
WBD has been on
quite a journey this past year toward internal integration and launching or
revising streaming platforms. While streaming app Max is rolled out
in the U.S, Hooper has responsibility for this rollout in EMEA due in the new
year.
“So far, they’ve
taken the tech stack of HBO Max and that of Discovery+ and created a new tech
stack for Max. That is only in the U.S. In EMEA, we still have Discovery+ and
HBO Max on separate legacy tech stacks,” she says. “Part of the process of
global rollout - to LATAM and APAC as well as Europe, to get tech and product
teams on the same page. It’s going through all the different components of the
tech stack and picking the best of both worlds.”
A good example is
the design system, she notes. “The look and feel of the brand that existed on
HBO Max has been transferred to Max. It had an inherent flexibility that could
be easily integrated across partner integration systems. Another super important
part of our integration was the underlying code that was built for Discovery+
because that was seen as more robust and able to give us greater flexibility.
That was transported across to Max.”
TNT Sports update
TNT Sports is
the joint venture between BT Sport and Discovery streamed on
Discovery+. It is now showing UEFA Champions League matches on
Discovery+ in the UK and Ireland. In October, the BT Sports app will close and
Discovery+ becomes the sole app until the Max launch.
“You can add TNT
Sports to your subscription if you are a Discovery+ customer. All the content
previously under BT Sport is now flowing through TNT sports including Premier
League and the new Champions League season,” Hooper Rosa said.
Tailored operations
Also on the panel
with Hooper Rosa was Lisa Watts, Manager of Partner Operations at YouTube Primetime
Channels. YouTube Primetime launched last November with 40 channels, and in
Germany earlier this year with ten channels. Since Europe is not as homogenous
as the U.S., there are some differences in rollout.
“European
broadcasters tend to use different standards for metadata and delivery
processes than the U.S., so you never really know what you’re going to find
until you start doing the deliveries,” Watts said. “The earlier my team is able
to get into discussion with partners, the easier the integration will go. Even
in the pre-deal stages, it’s really important we understand where we might get
stuck, not at the eleventh hour. How are we planning to receive a linear
stream, for example. Those willing to test with us early in those pre-deal
stages are the best partners for us.”
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