The online streaming market in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region promises to be an interesting area to watch out as the region shows strong consumption for online videos. Earlier in the year, local players rolled up their sleeves to face increased competition as international players such as Netflix made way into the region. Arabian Marketer’s Senior Correspondent Asma Wangde caught up with Carlos Tibi, CEO, Icflix, a streaming platform that provides services throughout the world, to understand how online streaming will shape up and some of the challenges ahead for similar companies. Excerpts:
On How 2015 Fared For Icflix & 2016 Plans…
One of our great achievements for 2015 was our in-house Jazwood (Arabic) co-production for example ‘Alf Leila we Leila’ that was launched over the Ramadan period. This was followed by our first animated TV series, ‘Dunia’, introducing the first Arabian teen female superhero. For our expansion growth for 2016, we will be concentrating on our productions from Morocco. Another achievement for Icflix was the expansion of our native app on devices such as PS4, Android TV and Roku set top boxes. Icflix is now available on more than 12,000+ devices.
On Online Video Trends In The Region…
The OTT (over the top) landscape has grown rapidly. The number of connected devices such as tablets and smart TVs is fueling the demand for OTT because consumers love the convenience and accessibility of being able to watch what they want, when they want and where they want. With infrastructure improving and internet speeds picking up, people want high quality video on any device and a seamless experience that carries across all their devices. Also with mobile devices readily available and extremely intelligent to stream content, and with the screens becoming larger with every new release from the major mobile manufacturers, consumers are more inclined to leverage their devices as their personal video viewing instruments. As a result, we are seeing a big jump on access from mobile devices.
On Challenges Ahead…
English subtitling for Arabic productions is still a challenge to us because prior to 2013, the Egyptian distributors did not have a post-production time coded script for subtitling services, which makes it difficult to make subtitles for older films. We are doing a lot of research to ensure that we can deliver 4k streaming at the lowest possible bandwidth without interrupting the quality. Providing a technical solution to deliver our content in the best quality, at the lowest bandwidth, in a way that is very usable and exciting for the user is our ever-present challenge. Another challenge at the start was the localization of payment gateways. However we developed our own payment gateway to address the local markets across the MENA region. We faced problems in the past in securing content deals because some entertainment providers in the region would buy outright output deals from the major studios so no one else could get rights to the content. However, the situation is changing slowly and hopefully the studios will realize that they are locking their content from propagating for more viewers.
On Icflix’ Evolving Business Model…
Our business model has also evolved to offer pay-per-view alongside subscription because of the demand for latest content straight after its cinematic release. The PPV offering will in turn also help tackle the issues of piracy and illegal downloading in the region. Icflix also has strategic partnerships in place with telecom operators by becoming their video-on-demand arm for them and for Icflix to be able to leverage infrastructure for localized billing purposes. This also gives telecom operators another opportunity to increase the ARPU (average revenue per user) for data consumption and makes legal streaming available to a wide audience.
On The Arabic Focus For MENA…
Our prime focus currently is original Arabic productions. There is a constant demand for local content. With Icflix venturing into original productions, we want to ensure that we cater to the needs of the local market and provide filmmakers a platform and opportunity to express their art and creativity and allow them to grow and exist in the market. We are working on number of productions in Morocco, a new TV show titled ‘Familia’ for 2016. We are also co-producing ‘Burn Out’ with director Noureddine Lakhmari, which will be final installment of the trilogy following ‘Casanegra’ and ‘Zero’ as well as the movie, ‘Come Back’, which will be the first movie to tackle the Daesh problem and its ramifications on the Arab community living both abroad and in MENA.
On Differentiation From Competition…
We differentiate ourselves by the content we offer to our users. For example, we are the only VOD (video on demand) service to offer Hollywood, Jazwood and Bollywood on a single platform service. Also our focus on original production does not only differentiate Icflix as a brand but also helps to enhance Arab content production. This enables Icflix to become the only place for viewers to watch original content.
