INSUBCONTINENT EXCLUSIVE:
Disney plans to bring its on-demand video streaming service to India and some Southeast Asian markets as soon as the second half of next
year, two sources familiar with the company plans told TechCrunch.
In India, the company plans to bring Disney+ catalog to Hotstar, a
popular video streaming service it owns, after the end of next year IPL cricket tournament in May, the people said.
Soon afterwards, the
company plans to expand Hotstar with Disney+ catalog to Indonesia and Malaysia among other Southeast Asian nations, said those people on the
condition of anonymity.
A spokesperson for Hotstar declined to comment.
Hotstar leads the Indian video streaming market
The service said it had more than 300 million monthly subscribers during the IPL cricket tournament and ICC World Cup earlier this year
More than 25 million users simultaneously streamed one of the matches, setting a new global record.
However, Hotstar monthly userbase
plummets below 60 million in weeks following IPL tournament, according to people who have seen the internal analytics
The arrival of more originals from Disney on Hotstar, which already offers a number of Disney-owned titles in India, could help the service
sustain users after cricket seasons.
The international expansion of Hotstar isn&t a surprise as it has entered the U.S., Canada, and the U.K
In an interview with TechCrunch earlier this year, Ipsita Dasgupta, president of Hotstar international operations, said so far the platform
international strategy has been to enter markets with &high density of Indians.&
In an earnings call for the quarter that ended in June this
year, Disney CEO Robert Iger hinted that the company, which snagged Indian entertainment conglomerate Star India as part of its $71.3
billion deal with 21st Century Fox, would bring Star India-operated Hotstar to Southeast Asian markets, though he did not offer a
timeline.
Disney+, currently available in the U.S, Canada and the Netherlands, will expand to Australia and New Zealand next week, and the
U.K., Germany, Italy, France and Spain on March 31, the company announced last week.
Price hike
Disney, which debut its video streaming
this week and has already amassed over 10 million subscribers, plans to raise the monthly subscription price of Hotstar in India, where the
service currently costs $14 a year, one of the two aforementioned people said.
A screenshot of Hotstar homepage
The price hike will happen
towards the end of the first quarter next year, just ahead of commencement of next IPL cricket tournament season, they said
The company has not decided exactly how much it intends to charge, but one of the people said that it could go as high as $30 a year.
In
other Southeast Asian markets, the service is likely to cost above $30 a year as well, both of the sources said
The prices have yet to be finalized, however, they said.
Even at those suggested price points, Disney would be able to undercut rivals on
Until recently, Netflix charged at least $7 a month in India and other Southeast Asian markets
But this year, the on-demand streaming pioneer introduced a $2.8 monthly tier in India and $4 in Malaysia.
Hotstar offers a large library of
local movies and titles syndicated from international cable networks and studios Showtime, HBO, and ABC (also owned by Disney)
In its current international markets, Hotstar catalog is limited to some local content and large library of Indian titles.
In recent
quarters, Hotstar has also set up an office in Tsinghua Science Park in Beijing, China and hired over 60 engineers and researchers as it
looks to expand its tech infrastructure to service more future users, according to job recruitment posts and other data sourced from
