72 HAPPENING Nordic TV Summit
Last month, FEED was a partner at the annual Nordic TV Summit. The event featured great presentations and lots of networking NETWORKING AT THE NORDIC TV SUMMIT
ast month, FEED had the pleasure of partnering with the ninth annual Nordic TV Summit at the Grill Academy
HYGGE NETWORKING A packed day of learning, mingling and swapping ideas still leaves plenty of time for fun, entertainment, eating and drinking...
in Copenhagen. Hosted by TV app developer 24i, the event offered a full day of conference sessions and networking and more networking, and food and more networking and drinks and a boat ride, then more food then more drinks then dancing… Attendees count it as one of their favourite industry gatherings of the year – and it’s easy to see why. The Nordic Media Summit frowns on sponsored speakers and canned pitches. The presentations and panels are designed to provide good information from industry leaders and a certain amount of trust has built up over the years. AREAS OF INNOVATION Hizam Sahibudeen, Head of Engineering at iflix, gave an especially riveting presentation. Western OTT giants like Netflix haven’t yet made the big gains they had hoped for in Asia. iflix, an ad-driven streaming content service started in 2015, has had explosive growth and threatens to be a Netflix-killer in the region. Originally launched in Malaysia and the Philippines, it is currently available in 28 countries across Asia and Africa. In his presentation, Sahibudeen said the potential total iflix audience is one billion people. The iflix story is exciting. The idea of a group of
guys starting in a garage in Kuala Lumpur taking on Netflix has a universal appeal. The company is now entertaining Chinese financial and technological backing. “The US is not the area of innovation anymore in Asia,” said Sahibudeen. “The innovation is now coming from inside Asia.” Analyst Ben Keen offered his “Myths and Realities of the OTT Video Business”. Myth Number One was, “The US is the streaming video leader; Europe is just a follower”. Keen was keen to point out that three of the five top SVOD markets in the world are in the Nordics and that Europe is way ahead of the rest of the world in terms of UHD TV availability. Myth Two: “Tech is driving video consumption patterns to change faster than ever before” was countered by the staggering fact that in the US last year, physical media (DVDs etc) was worth more than Netflix, and that Netflix itself generated $248 million in profit during 2017 from its DVD rental service alone! His Myth Three? “Cord-cutting is sending pay TV into a death spiral, leaving OTT services to take over”. Keen noted that the spend in pay TV is still much larger than SVOD and only in North America has the pay TV market been contracting.
SEE YOU NEXT YEAR Other presentations throughout the day included Kjersti Cuddeford of Altibox; Arash Pendari, CEO of Vionlabs; Ida Olsen, Design Director at Sony Pictures Entertainment; Hans van Rijn, General Manager of Fox Nordics; and a “fireside chat” with Android TV’s Jackie Barnham. FEED hosted the summit’s only discussion panel, a debate called “Using Sports and Live Streaming to Monetize OTT Platforms”. Moderated by FEED editor Neal Romanek, the panel featured Hizam Sahibudeen, Head of Engineering at iflix; Stig Møller Christiansen, Pay TV Director at TV2 Denmark; Mikkel Eskildsen, Digital Content Manager at Eurosport; and Flemming Fjeldgaard, Head of Viaplay Denmark. n Tickets for Nordic TV Summit 2019 are already on sale. Their tenth anniversary promises to be a very special event – and we hope to see you there!
ATTENDEES COUNT IT ASONE OF THEIR FAVOURITE INDUSTRY GATHERINGSOF THE YEAR, AND IT’SEASYTOSEEWHY
feedzine feed.zine feedmagazine.tv
Powered by FlippingBook