Rakuten TV Unpacks Growth Plans & Partners With Polish Streamer Pilot WP To Launch Online Movie Store With ‘Anora’, ‘Conclave’ & Local Hits
EXCLUSIVE: Rakuten TV and Polish streamer Pilot WP have joined forces to launch an online store with Hollywood movies including Aor, Wicked and Conclave as well as numerous local titles. The transactional-VOD (TVOD) service will be co-branded and available to Pilot WP users in Poland.
Streaming platform PilotWP is owned by Audioteka, part of Polish media outfit Wirtualna Polska. “Thanks to its partnership with Rakuten TV and the launch of the TVOD model, Pilot WP is opening another new chapter, this time in access to the best films – from cinema premieres to cult classics,” said Jagna Wiszniewska, VP of Content at Audioteka Group.
Streaming platform Rakuten TV started out in TVOD before branching out into advertising-supported VOD (AVOD) and free ad-supported streaming (FAST) channels.
Marcos Milanez is Rakuten TV’s Chief Content Officer, overseeing its content buying and programming teams. In a crowded streaming landscape, he breaks down the Japanese-owned company’s strategy in a sit-down with Deadline.
Having ad-supported, rental, buy-to-own and linear viewing options is what differentiates Rakuten TV he says.
“We call it ‘streaming freedom’. We want to identify relevant quality content, locally relevant as well, and then the choice is up to the customer whether to buy-to-own, or rent, or watch free with ads, and whether to watch on-demand or linear. That’s the first premise of what we want to offer as a platform.”
He adds: “That’s one of our unique differentials, having all of these options. Amazon was the closest because they had Freevee [which shuttered late last year]. But it was just in selected countries, whereas we are in all of Europe.”
With various streaming options available direct-to-consumer, or as part of a connected TV ecosystem, Rakuten TV has also launched what it calls its ‘enterprise’ offering. It involves using its streaming know-how, including ad sales, to launch FAST channels for third parties.
“TVOD is pretty much a stable business and AVOD and FAST is where it grows from a B2C perspective,” Milanez says. “Now we also have this important B2B business, which is enterprise, where we can act as a white label to content partners.”
FAST Growth
FAST has boomed in recent years and Rakuten has been part of that story since launching its first channels in 2019. Platforms were in a rush to add more and more FAST channels to their offerings, but the trend now is to pare back.
“It was like a gold rush,” Milanez says. “We were a bit more cautious than other competitor platforms, so our lineup had about 100 channels, but you could easily find platforms with 150 or 200.
“At the end of the day, it’s not about quantity, it’s the quality and the relevance of the channels. There’s still a lot that needs to be improved in terms of discoverability. We definitely don’t want to go towards the direction that America was going in with 400 or even more channels.”
The trend in FAST is also towards country-specific channels and content, the Rakuten TV content chief says. “The vast majority of our lineups, and also our competitors, are now localized channels.”
While the U.S. FAST market looks increasingly mature Milanez thinks the international and European sector is still in growth mode. “I don’t think it is at yet at the level of America,” he says. “The advertising pie will grow even further on CTV across Europe.”
