{"id":512166,"date":"2023-10-21T09:00:03","date_gmt":"2023-10-21T07:00:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/?p=512166"},"modified":"2023-10-21T09:00:03","modified_gmt":"2023-10-21T07:00:03","slug":"dstv-faces-another-major-threat","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/investing\/512166-dstv-faces-another-major-threat.html","title":{"rendered":"DStv faces another major threat"},"content":{"rendered":"

Amazon is coming to South Africa. Apart from\u00a0taking on Takealot and Makro<\/strong><\/a>, its Amazon Prime offering poses a serious threat to MultiChoice\u2019s DStv and Showmax.<\/p>\n

Amazon announced it will\u00a0launch Amazon.co.za in 2024, giving local sellers access to the world\u2019s most popular e-commerce platform.<\/p>\n

The exact launch date has not been specified as it is determined by the engagements with sellers and local partners in the coming months.<\/p>\n

Most people focus on Amazon\u2019s impact on online shopping, but the e-commerce giant\u2019s value proposition extends far beyond online shopping.<\/p>\n

The South African launch, dubbed \u201cProject Fela\u201d, will start with its marketplace and \u201cFulfilment by Amazon\u201d service for third-party sellers.<\/p>\n

Amazon\u2019s Prime membership programme is set to become available to South Africans shortly after its marketplace launch.<\/p>\n

The company is playing its cards close to its chest and has chosen not to provide an official comment regarding the reports on Amazon Prime in South Africa.<\/p>\n

However, Amazon Prime formed a core part of its offering in many other countries where it launched.<\/p>\n

Amazon Prime gives subscribers a myriad of shipping, shopping, streaming, reading, and other benefits.<\/p>\n

Prime members enjoy better delivery, get exclusive product deals, qualify for rewards and cash-back on purchases, and can borrow books and magazines from the Prime Reading catalogue.<\/p>\n

Free games, exclusive in-game content, and a free Twitch channel subscription are also part of the subscription.<\/p>\n

The biggest benefit of Amazon Prime, outside of expedited shipping, is the Amazon Prime Video streaming service.<\/p>\n

Prime Video offers unlimited streaming of movies and TV episodes, with the option to add video subscriptions to services like Showtime, A&E, and AMC.<\/p>\n

The standalone version of Prime Video has been available in South Africa<\/strong><\/a> since 14 December 2016.<\/p>\n

While it doesn’t offer the option to bolt on content from other services like Amazon Prime in the US, it includes thousands of TV shows and movies.<\/p>\n

These include shows like The Boys<\/em>, The Wheel of Time<\/em>, The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power<\/em>,\u00a0 The Grand Tour<\/em>, Invincible<\/em>, and The Legend of Vox Machina<\/em>.<\/p>\n

In November 2021, Amazon informed South African subscribers that it would begin billing them in rand<\/strong><\/a>, setting the monthly price of Prime Video at R79 per month.<\/p>\n

Although Prime Video is already available in South Africa, the great benefits of Amazon Prime will encourage many South Africans to sign up for the service.<\/p>\n

They may reconsider paying hundreds of rands for DStv when they get access to Prime Video as part of their subscription.<\/p>\n

For context, South Africans can subscribe to Amazon Prime for significantly less than a low-end DStv package.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

Gideon Khobane, Director of Prime Video Africa. Former CEO of SuperSport and MultiChoice Group Executive for General Entertainment.<\/p><\/div>\n

MultiChoice has previously said streaming services, like Netflix and Amazon Prime, pose \u201can existential competitive threat\u201d to its DStv business.<\/p>\n

The broadcaster has most likely overstated the competitive threat from streaming services \u2013 it was part of a competition hearing, after all \u2013 but Amazon Prime must be of concern to the company.<\/p>\n

South African families are under pressure to cut costs, and an Amazon Prime subscription\u2019s online shopping and entertainment value is unmatched.<\/p>\n

What makes Amazon Prime a particularly big threat to MultiChoice in South Africa is the pay-TV provider\u2019s strategy.<\/p>\n

MultiChoice is betting big on its streaming service<\/a><\/strong>, Showmax, driving revenue and profit growth in future.<\/p>\n

MultiChoice partnered with Comcast-owned NBCUniversal and Sky to create the leading streaming service in Africa and beat competitors like Netflix and Disney+.<\/p>\n

Besides new technology, the partnership with NBCUniversal and Sky will bring international content to the Showmax platform.<\/p>\n

By partnering with Comcast and through its planned products and price offerings, MultiChoice expects a step-change in customer numbers in the future.<\/p>\n

\u201cSpeaking to affordability and content preferences of African customers, we expect to have three times more customers than initially envisaged,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

To facilitate this growth, MultiChoice is ramping up its investment in its Showmax platform and local content. It wants to create ten times more local content within ten years.<\/p>\n

MultiChoice expects Showmax to have the same 3 to 5-year J-curve as its global peers in the streaming industry.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are aiming to generate revenue of more than $1 billion after five years, with a trading profit breakeven target in full-year 2027,\u201d the company said.<\/p>\n

However, with increased competition from Amazon Prime \u2014 in addition to Netflix, Disney+, and others \u2013 it will not be easy to make Showmax the top streaming service in Africa.<\/p>\n

Amazon\u2019s launch in South Africa can, therefore, impact MultiChoice and DStv and put significant pressure on Showmax\u2019s growth.<\/p>\n

\n

A version of this article was first published by Daily Investor<\/a><\/strong> and is republished with permission.<\/em><\/p>\n

Now read:\u00a0Amazon vs Takealot \u2014 South African seller fees and delivery options compared<\/a><\/h3>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Amazon is coming to South Africa. Apart from taking on Takealot and Makro, Amazon Prime poses a serious threat to MultiChoice’s DStv and Showmax.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":341108,"featured_media":501996,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_sma_x_autopost_status":"idle","_sma_x_autopost_error":"","_sma_x_post_id":"","_sma_facebook_post_id":"","_sma_instagram_post_id":"","_sma_threads_post_id":"","_sma_x_attempts":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[80335],"tags":[723,16692,39088,85,35,475],"class_list":["post-512166","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-investing","tag-amazon","tag-amazon-prime","tag-amazon-prime-video","tag-dstv","tag-headline","tag-multichoice"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/512166"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/341108"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=512166"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/512166\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":512168,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/512166\/revisions\/512168"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/501996"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=512166"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=512166"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=512166"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}