How Asian Streamer Viu Is Preventing Off World Competitors – Deadline

EXCLUSIVE: Pan-regional streaming service Viu, owned by Hong Kong telco and media group PCCW, has been one of many greatest native success tales in Southeast Asia, holding its personal towards the doorway of worldwide giants together with Netflix, Amazon Prime Video and Disney+.

The streamer is primary when it comes to month-to-month lively customers (MAUs) throughout Southeast Asia, in accordance with information from Media Companions Asia (MPA), and quantity three in paid subscribers behind Disney+ and Netflix. Within the first half of 2022, Viu’s MAUs grew by 23% to 60.7 million, whereas paid subscribers elevated by 31% to 9.1 million. 

Viu’s ‘freemium’ enterprise mannequin and partnerships with regional telcos and different tech suppliers have contributed to that success, however as Asia content material chief Marianne Lee explains, it’s additionally all the way down to a nimble and hyper-localized content material technique. 

“We serve a really younger viewers,” says Lee, who joined Viu final 12 months from WarnerMedia within the position of Chief of Content material Acquisition & Improvement for Asia (Viu additionally operates as a streamer and content material producer within the Center East and South Africa). 

“Our viewers is younger they usually’re digital natives. They could have disregarded that pay-TV stage and moved straight into watching content material on their cellphones. We’re additionally mass viewers, so in Hong Kong we intention for Cantonese audio system, and in Malaysia we intention for the viewers that speaks Malay.” 

That offers Viu barely completely different positioning to the worldwide streamers, which are actually beginning to go mass market in Southeast Asia, however had been initially aiming for barely older, skilled viewers with better means to pay. 

Launched in 2015, the 12 months earlier than Netflix entered the area, Viu had an early begin in Korean drama and Japanese anime, two content material classes that play throughout the area, and has additionally expanded to supply content material in Chinese language and Southeast Asian languages. Ok-drama alone accounts for 38% of premium viewing in Southeast Asia, in accordance with MPA information. Requested to clarify the success of Korean content material, Lee sums it up as: “Stunning units, stunning individuals and the enhancing is tremendous participating.” 

In fact, over the previous few years, the demand for Korean content material has reached such heights that it’s additionally turn into prohibitively costly. However Lee explains that Viu is leveraging long-standing relationships with all of the Korean broadcasters, together with CJ ENM, JTBC, SBS and the general public broadcasters, and is now additionally beginning to transfer upstream.

Sometimes, Viu acquires worldwide rights to Ok-dramas and simulcasts them to its streaming markets instantly after they’ve broadcast in Korea. It additionally syndicates to Asian territories the place it doesn’t function as a streamer, together with Japan, Taiwan and Vietnam, in addition to additional afield. Lee factors to Viu Unique Reborn Wealthy, starring Track Joong-ki (Vincenzo), as a great instance of how the streamer is now boarding exhibits a lot earlier – working on this case with broadcaster JTBC and its manufacturing arm Studio LuluLala (SLL). 

“We’d already constructed these relationships with the broadcasters, and now we’re working way more intently with the manufacturing homes,” explains Lee. “Which means we get entangled a lot earlier, having enter on the casting and the scripts. In fact it’s aggressive – everybody needs the ‘S Grade’ [Super Grade] collection, however we’re not all chasing the identical content material, as all of us have a sure demographic in thoughts.” 

The identical simulcast technique is used for Korean selection exhibits and different codecs, though Lee says it’s clearly a lot more durable to get content material subtitled and out on its platform nearly instantly whenever you’re working with unscripted exhibits. 

Viu has additionally had success by way of tapping into different sizzling content material developments. Lee says that Chinese language content material can be beginning to play throughout the area: “We’ve seen that the costume, fantasy, palace genres work very well in Chinese language-speaking markets [Hong Kong, Singapore, Malaysia], whereas the modern, city dramas can journey exterior these territories to Thailand and Indonesia.” 

However she predicts that the following huge wave is prone to be Thai content material, together with the BL [Boys’ Love] style that’s changing into big in Asia however just about unknown within the West. Originating within the ‘Shonen-ai’ style of Japanese manga, BL options stunning younger males engaged in (often fairly tame) gay relationships, however is usually consumed by younger ladies and teenage ladies. 

Viu’s Thai BL hits embrace Shut Pal, that includes six pairs of males experiencing completely different types of love, however ‘straight’ Thai collection are additionally working nicely – together with romcom My Bubble Tea and romantic drama Discovering The Rainbow, each starring Nichkun, a Thai-American star who can be a member of Ok-pop band 2PM. “The Thai trade actually is aware of methods to place and market their stars,” says Lee. “They’ve discovered quite a bit from the Korean trade and are making larger exhibits. Discovering The Rainbow is Nichkun’s second venture with us – it’s a superbly filmed, epic love story set from the early Nineties till the current day.” 

However there are additionally rumblings in different Southeast Asian territories. Along with Thailand, Viu has manufacturing places of work in Malaysia, the place it has produced crime drama Black and romcom She Was Fairly, each tailored from Korean IP; the Philippines, the place Viu Originals embrace music-themed collection Nonetheless and Ok-Love, described as an ‘ode to Ok-drama’; and Indonesia, the place current exhibits embrace an adaptation of Fairly Little Liars, already into Season 2, and Dangerous Boys vs Loopy Ladies, about rebellious college students scheming methods to escape from their boarding college. 

Describing Dangerous Boys vs Loopy Ladies as a “responsible pleasure” she likes to look at herself, Lee says that each one these Southeast Asian markets are maturing quickly. “For instance, Indonesia is transferring previous diversifications, and the workforce there’s doing an awesome job of participating scriptwriters and deciding on attention-grabbing IPs.”

Again dwelling in Hong Kong, Viu’s sister free-to-air broadcaster ViuTV, has been bringing youthful audiences again to Cantonese-language content material with youth-focused dramas, selection exhibits and sizzling boy band Mirror, the primary real Canto-pop breakout in a number of years. This native content material, which Viu subtitles and simulcasts throughout the area, reverses a development of younger Hong Kong-ers concerning native TV as old style and turning as a substitute to English-language exhibits. 

Lee explains, nonetheless, that the Hong Kong market is barely completely different to Southeast Asia. Viu’s Hong Kong viewers skews younger, however not as younger as elsewhere, and it’s a market that embraces live-action Japanese drama along with anime. Japanese BL present Ossan’s Love was so well-liked in Hong Kong it resulted in a Cantonese remake. 

“Hong Kong simply has a really lengthy historical past of consuming Japanese content material,” says Lee, who’s herself from Hong Kong and has additionally labored in Singapore for world studios and broadcasters. “We’re very influenced by Japanese tradition. Throughout the pandemic all my pals complained that they couldn’t go to Japan, and all described it as their second dwelling.”