Showmax beat Netflix and still failed
MultiChoice’s decision to shut down Showmax has prompted widespread commentary on the streaming platform’s massive losses. However, there is more to the story of how Showmax landed in a death spiral.
Showmax’s financial results were undeniably grim. Trading losses ballooned from R1.2 billion in the 2023 financial year to R2.6 billion in 2024 and R4.9 billion in 2025.
Revenue also declined from R1.027 billion to R753 million between 2024 and 2025. MultiChoice attempted to explain away the decline by claiming it was temporary.
It said its revenue shrank after discontinuing Showmax Pro, which included a limited selection of live sports, and its overseas Showmax diaspora offering.
Officially, MultiChoice said that it shut down Showmax’s international operations to focus on Africa. However, industry speculation suggests it was due to its deal with NBCUniversal.
While many commentators have pointed to these numbers as evidence that Showmax simply could not attract subscribers or compete in the African streaming market, that is not true.
Showmax’s paying subscriber base grew by 50% year-on-year to September 2024 and by 44% during the full 2025 financial year.
Estimates suggested that Showmax had overtaken Netflix’s 1.8 million African subscribers by the end of 2023, reaching 2.1 million users, and continued growing after its relaunch in February 2024.
The real reason Showmax failed was not poor market fit or an inability to attract subscribers on the African continent.
It was poor leadership and decision-making that saddled the business with crippling financial commitments before it had any chance of reaching scale.
The basic concept behind Showmax 2.0 was solid — a locally focused streaming service built on world-class technology with premium content.
However, it was the financial structure surrounding the NBCUniversal deal that doomed the platform before it could find its footing.
What only became clear after MultiChoice published its first set of results following the NBCUniversal partnership was the scale of the financial hole that the management team at the time had dug.
For example, MultiChoice took out a R12 billion multi-party term loan facility to fund its working capital and support the relaunched Showmax business.
Lenders raised concerns about the impact of the Showmax funding requirements on MultiChoice’s loan covenants, reflecting just how stretched the company’s balance sheet had become.
Reckless optimism
MultiChoice’s leadership justified saddling Showmax with such a massive financial burden through recklessly optimistic forecasts.
The pay-TV giant said Africa was the final frontier for subscription video-on-demand growth, which is why many international players are targeting the continent.
MultiChoice was so bullish that it said Showmax would help it reach a combined subscriber base of 50 million users by 2028.
To capture this exponential growth opportunity that MultiChoice believed existed, it entered into a partnership agreement and sold a 30% stake in Showmax to Comcast subsidiary NBCUniversal.
The transaction closed and became effective on 4 April 2023. MultiChoice confirmed in its last full annual results that it still owned a 70% controlling stake in Showmax.
“The total subscription price for the sale of 30% of the existing Showmax business was an amount of USD29m (ZAR536m), which was received on 4 April 2023 and contributed to Showmax on this date.”
While MultiChoice’s initial projections accounted for Showmax making trading losses, it predicted that the losses would begin decreasing by its 2025 financial year. However, the opposite happened.
The Peacock platform deal
Another damaging commitment was the seven-year technology licensing agreement with NBCUniversal for the use of a Showmax-branded version of the Peacock streaming platform.
The decision to license Peacock’s technology rather than build or acquire a platform was driven by a shortage of engineering talent and the need for scalability, according to MultiChoice’s former leadership.
This effectively committed a start-up African streaming business with uncertain revenues to billions of rand in fixed costs denominated in a foreign currency, leaving almost no margin for error.
According to MultiChoice’s 2024 annual results, the company had contracted R6.825 billion in Peacock platform fees.
These commitments had not yet been recognised as obligations in the financial statements, but the company was contractually bound to pay them.
The agreement also included managed services from Peacock to facilitate and support Showmax’s use of the platform.
By March 2025, the commitments had decreased to R5.819 billion as some obligations were fulfilled, but the remaining liability remained enormous relative to Showmax’s revenue base.
Showmax generated R753 million in revenue during its 2025 financial year — an almost 27% decline from the R1.03 billion it reported the year before.
MultiChoice and NBCUniversal provided equity injections to keep Showmax afloat, signalling that the business was burning through cash.
Canal+ CEO Maxime Saada described the outcome generously when he said Showmax was not a commercial success and that the investments in marketing, content, and technology had been excessive.
Despite Showmax’s solid line-up of international and local content, and steady subscriber growth since its relaunch on the Peacock platform, the financial burden it was saddled with at the outset was simply insurmountable.
Canal+ is now expected to deploy its own in-house streaming platform across MultiChoice’s African markets, having already operated its Canal+ app in more than 30 countries.
The Showmax black hole
The table and chart below show Showmax’s reported financial performance over MultiChoice’s past three financial years.
| Financial year | Revenue | Trading loss |
|---|---|---|
| 31 March 2023 | R839 million | R1.2 billion |
| 31 March 2024 | R1.027 billion | R2.6 billion |
| 31 March 2025 | R753 million | R4.9 billion |
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