International OTT Competition Growing, CreaTV Media Boss Says

Beyond the major over-the-top players based in the U.S., several international operations also have designs on customers beyond their borders, CreaTV Media Chairman Peter Csathy blogged Tuesday. "Multiple mega-companies" are vying to be the Netflix of China, he said, with Baidu's iQiyi planning its own original content strategy, plus Alibaba's Youku Tudou, Tencent and Wanda Cinemas' Line's Mtime in operation. Csathy said Bison Group's majority stake in U.S.-based OTT platform Cinedigm was aimed not only at Chinese viewers but also at bringing Chinese content to U.S. audiences. But Csathy said the lesson of LeEco -- which in 2016 was proclaiming itself the Netflix of China, only to scuttle its buy of Vizio and its plans for the U.S. OTT market -- is that effectively launching and monetizing digital-first video services is increasingly challenging given the competition, and internationalizing a customer base is even more difficult. Csathy said partnerships are proving key to accessing foreign markets, with examples ranging from Hooq -- a Singtel/Sony/Warner Brothers joint venture -- and iflix, backed by Hearst, Liberty Global and Sky and with access to flagship Disney content. He said Netflix and Amazon Prime have significant presence in Europe, but they face growing competition ranging from Sky to a joint venture between Discovery Communications and German media company ProSiebenSat.1.