Afrobility: Africa Tech and Business #35: MultiChoice - How the South African Pay TV pioneer became the largest entertainment provider across Africa
Overview: Today, we’re going to talk about MultiChoice - The African video entertainment provider. We’ll explore the MultiChoice story across 5 areas:
- South African video entertainment market context
- MultiChoice's launch & growth over time
- MultiChoice's product & monetization strategy
- Competition, primary & emerging businesses
- Overall outlook
This episode was recorded on August 15, 2021
Companies discussed: MultiChoice (M-Net), Naspers, MTN, ShowMax, BetKing, Comcast, Sky, DSTV, MTN, Iroko TV, HiTV, StarTimes, Vivendi Canal+, ROK Media, English Premier League, Netflix, HBO Max, ShowMax, Showtime & BBC
Business concepts discussed: Pan-African expansion strategy, Entertainment content acquisition strategy, subscription & hardware monetization strategy
Conversation highlights:
- (02:20) - Why we’re talking about MultiChoice
- (06:50) - South African TV context
- (15:28) - Origin and early history of MultiChoice
- (26:10) - Product & monetization strategy
- (34:05) - MultiChoice device / decoder strategy
- (38:20) - Content, Partnerships & M&A
- (42:30) - MultiChoice Financials and key metrics
- (46:54) - Competition across different business lines
- (51:40) - Non-core businesses and investments, BetKing
- (1:05:00) - Bankole’s overall thoughts and outlook
- (1:12:02) - Olumide’s overall thoughts and outlook
- (1:26:28) - Recommendations and small wins
Olumide’s recommendations & small wins:
- Recommendation: Die with Zero (Bill Perkins)
- Small wins: Night out with SF friends & Sailing with friends in Sausalito
Bankole’s recommendations & small wins:
- Recommendation: Omah Lay - Understand & Robert Smith of Vista Equity on Money Maze Podcast
- Small wins: Attended a wedding last weekend, Happy Married Life Dami! + Chelsea FC Winnning!
- Other content mentioned: South Africa as TV’s last frontier
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