SVOD giant Netflix, which launched in 130 new countries around the world earlier in the year, will announce its first quarter financial results on Monday in the US, with its international expansion to be a point of interest.Certainly, its impact has been felt at a local level since launching in the Australian market in March last year.
As reported by Fairfax Media, OzTAM figures show that prime time audiences for traditional television have declined almost 5 per cent in the year to date, in another indication of the impact of streaming services on traditional media.
Roy Morgan Research has tracked the growth and impact of Netflix on the local market, finding that by the end of 2015, 2,728,000 Australians 14+ (13.9 per cent) had Netflix, with over a million homes subscribed.
Since launch, Netflix has expanded at a rapid rate, and in turn has been re-shaping Australians’ viewing habits.
In February, Roy Morgan found that over one in seven Australians now watch no commercial television on a normal weekday, over twice as many as in 2008, with SVOD looking “set to make a bigger dent in the medium’s reach in 2016”.
“But aside from being simply a new competitive channel, internet streaming and downloading provided a whole new outlook on media consumption: content on-demand,” Roy Morgan observed.
“Now, commercial TV faces an even more direct competitor, in the form of subscription video-on-demand (SVOD), including Netflix, Stan, Presto, Quickflix and Foxtel Play.”
The OzTAM figures show free-to-air viewing audiences are down 14.8 per cent among 16-to-39-year-olds, while up 2.2 per cent in the plus-55 demographic, Fairfax has reported, while Foxtel prime time audiences are down 5.3 per cent.
Tim Martin, Roy Morgan Research general manager – media, noted in February that commercial networks “will need to become more innovative with content and scheduling, rights deals and partnerships, how advertising is incorporated into programming”.
“Most viewers aren’t desperately to avoid any advertising whatsoever – it’s just that there are more easy ways to circumvent it, so why not record a show and skip through ads, download it, legally or illegally, subscribe to SVOD, or simply switch attention to the tablet or phone the second an ad break arrives,” Martin commented.
Meanwhile, as reported by USA Today, Netflix is expected to deliver revenue growth of 25 per cent, with subscriber numbers increasing on the back of its international expansion.
Netflix has previously forecast quarter one subscriber growth of 6.1 million net additions, compared to the prior year of 4.88 million.
As reported by USA Today, a point of interest will also be Netflix’s outlook for US subscriber trends in the April-June quarter, with many members to see a US$2 price rise next month.
