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Streaming
TV Comeback: First Quarter of 2022 Breaks Streaming Renewal Records
Streaming services are making headlines about their dwindling subscriber numbers, but the television series housed on these platforms are still standing strong. According to data firm Ampere Analysis which looked at U.S. and U.K. streaming platforms, more series were renewed for another season in Q1 of 2022 than ever before. Surprisingly, 51% of these renewals come from shows in their fourth season or later, which is a 6% increase from 2020. This contradicts a previous report by Ampere Analysis which argued that streaming services were more likely to cancel shows in early seasons compared to network TV, and Netflix accounted for 61% of all streaming cancellations. This rise in renewals is likely tied to the increase of streaming platforms currently available to the market, and unscripted TV on Discovery+ made up the largest portion of Q1 renewals. Olivia Deane, a senior analyst for Ampere Analysis, said, "For streaming newcomers like Disney+ and Discovery+, which have well-established fan bases for key IP, it's easier for commissioners to make long-term commitments to titles they know viewers will love.” While Netflix renewals dropped 2% from the number of renewals in 2020, the streaming war is still going strong as these newer services are creating and sustaining content at incredible rates.
Industry
Hollywood Market Crash: Will Entertainment Recover With Digital Strategies?
While the COVID pandemic accelerated the Entertainment industry to new heights, recent market shifts are showing cracks in the foundation. On May 18, the Dow Jones Industrial Average dropped by 1,164.52 points, or 3.57%. This was not just a result of a bad trading day, but an inevitable loss as entertainment has shown signs of struggle over the past few months. For big media, Disney, Netflix, Warner Bros. Discovery and Comcast, billions of dollars have been lost in the first five months of a year. According to Liska Schmitz, Managing Director and Partner at consulting firm BCG, “Wall Street is not rewarding subscriber growth anymore.” Now, investors are focusing more on profits, making them hesitant to spend. The falling stock prices met with rising interest and inflation, are increasing pressure for companies to deliver earnings to investors, which will have a major impact on the creative side of Hollywood. The current landscape is very precarious and the hope of streaming coming to save the day is fading with subscriber numbers. While digital transformation has encouraged several entertainment giants to build out direct-to-consumer platforms, companies that focus less on these costly platforms are the ones that are easily riding out the storm. While there is no turning back from our streaming growth, Robert Fishman, principal at research firm MoffettNathanson, believes that companies don’t need to retreat but reassess their ambitious content production plans. The stock meltdowns may not inspire ground-breaking change, but it is changing the financial narrative.
Television
Measurement Multiverse: New Analytics Companies Emerge As Nielsen Competitors
During the week of Television upfronts, many leaders in this space discussed the current challenge of accurate audience measurement. This comes not too long after Nielsen, the measurement company that had a monopoly on TV ratings, has made news over recent controversy regarding their inaccurate reporting as well as their recent private sale. As a result of Nielsen’s missteps, the company also lost its accreditation from the Media Rating Council, an industry oversight board. Linda Yaccarino, the Chairman of Global Advertising and Partnerships for NBCUniversal, said during their upfront that the media company is looking to “a future where multiple currencies deliver massive results.” This is already ringing true as a few other companies are rising in popularity as measurement alternatives, such as Comscore, iSpot.tv, EDO, and VideoAmp. The popularity of these new competitors is also due to their financing success. For example, Goldman Sachs invested $325 million in iSpot and Shamrock Capital led an $80 million funding infusion for EDO. Nielsen will still be present in this market, as they have plans to release a cross-platform measurement product called Nielsen One. While other media networks didn’t talk about Nielsen by name in their upfronts, many spoke about using multiple measurement tools to better access insights as well as help assure ad buyers that they will be able to reach desired audiences.
Sports
NFL Enters the Streaming Wars: Mobile-Focused Platform to Launch This Summer
During their owner meeting in Atlanta, it was revealed that the NFL is looking to break into the streaming world, starting this July. The Football League’s new streaming platform will be mobile-focused, offering content that will complement the experience of watching a game on the big screen. Game related content used to be shared for free, but these syndication deals have since expired, leaving the NFL an opportunity to try out a subscription-based model to distribute this content. The service will be called NFL+ and it will sell for $5 a month. While this offering will not include any content from the Sunday Ticket, which is the NFL’s sports package of all season games, this new platform raises questions about whether or not this broadcast package, currently only available through DirectTV, will also trade hands when it comes to ownership. Once the current contract expires, the Sunday Ticket deal is valued at $2.5 billion, and Apple and Amazon have their eyes on this NFL package. NFL is not the only organization looking to get into sports media, Major League Baseball and FIFA have also made similar streaming launch announcements. While NFL+ has yet to share plans about being a part of a larger football streaming package, this is still a possibility for the future. The league already has broadcast deals in place with networks, TV providers, and other streaming services, so the launch of NFL+ will showcase the number of dedicated football fans willing to pay for extra content.
DEI
Disparity in the Writer’s Room: Study Reveals Unequal Opportunities for Showrunners
The Think Tank for Inclusion and Equity (TTIE) recently released their fourth annual "Behind the Scenes Report," which surveyed 875 writers working in television. Sponsored by Women in Film and released in partnership with the Geena Davis Institute on Gender in Media, this report reveals the ongoing inequality in the industry. One of the key findings of this report exposes the disparity in compensation for those who develop projects, as 70 percent of writers from a historically marginalized racial group developed a project without pay compared to only 53 percent of writers without pay came from a non-marginalized background. The report also illustrated unequal career advancement opportunities, as white individuals had more success making the transition from writers' assistant to staff writer compared to those who are BIPOC. Of the showrunners who responded in the survey, 76 percent shared that they received no management training before entering the role and 48 percent would like additional resources around DEI. Along with the report, TTIE shared a list of best practices to achieve equity in the writing field. This list includes the call to better pay writers from historically excluded backgrounds, give more BIPOC writers the opportunity to run their own show, and implement training programs to teach showrunners about equity in the writers’ room. According to TTIE co-founder and co-chair Y. Shireen Razack, the organization hopes this report will help the industry shift in the right direction and they “invite our colleagues to use TTIE’s findings and recommendations as a guide.”
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