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Issue link: https://digital.macdirectory.com/i/1339792
CES program, CTA’s Steve Koenig noted, “It took Disney just five months to hit 50 million global subs whereas it took Netflix seven years. The point is that the events of the past year will transform the overall economy for the next decade.” According to CTA, the total spending on streaming services and software is projected to reach a record high of $112 billion in 2021 (11 percent growth over 2020), following 31 percent growth in 2020 over 2019.). CTA also projects that exclusive video content and cord-cutting are driving multiple subscriptions per household to push spending to $41B in 2021, up 15 percent over last year. One of the first things people did in the lockdown was upgrade their TVs. And according to CTA, the demand will continue through 2021. TV sales will slip slightly to $22B this year to 43M units, the second highest volume on record. Larger sets (55-inch and up) will experience the greatest growth. CTA notes that 8K UHD sets will increase 300 percent in 2021, which is difficult to understand because the terrestrial and streaming industry is only now sending 4K UHD content to the home. 8K content won’t become widely available for five years or until 5G wireless and 1Gb cable services are in place. Streaming providers – Netflix, Hulu, Amazon Prime Video, Disney+ – are the industry’s leading SVOD services with more than 55 percent of the total OTT content market, according to Nielsen; and show little sign of slowing. During one of several streaming service sessions at Virtual CES, executives from Starz, Warner, Philo and Pluto emphasized that every provider is in the battle to ensure customers find their content as quickly and easily as possible. Obviously, they aren’t succeeding because Ampere Analysis notes that the average U.S. streaming household has an average of four SVOD services and at least one AVOD service. In Western Europe, the average home has two subscription services. And despite a strong mix of original and catalog shows/movies in their lineups, it takes an average of 15 minutes to find something to watch! According to Ampere’s Guy Bisson, AVOD, studio-direct and broadcast streaming have brought the industry to change its thinking on the way content creators, distributors, aggregators, platforms and channels view the TV market. Regardless of how the content is delivered to the screen (smartphone, computer, table, big screen set) it’s simply TV. At the same time, studio executives realize that the movie industry won’t enjoy record growth and profits without theaters. Disney, Universal, Warner, Paramount and major/secondary studios around the globe recognize that theatrical releases are important--not just to their bottom line but also to the dedicated theater goer. During one of the online discussions, one executive noted that nine months of home/device streaming entertainment has firmly established the fact that people can and will enjoy what they want, where they want and, on the device, they want … even first run, tentpole productions. At the same time, there is a large segment of the population that can’t wait to escape their hibernation and return to the cinema to fully enjoy the total audio/video immersion of a film in a large venue … the way the producer and crew intended it to be experienced. Following new and strict production guidelines, producers and production teams around the globe have been back at work (successfully) for months, except in the U.S., which continues to have problems/issues with safe production. International facilities have done such a good job of controlling the pandemic issues that most in Canada, London, Central/Western Europe, New Zealand and others are solidly booked for the next five years. Just before virtual CES, Sony unveiled a pair of Crystal LED modular direct view displays for virtual production. Actually, it looks a lot like the ILM advanced LED Video Wall technology we first saw late last year that Disney/ILM used in producing Cats, The Lion King and The Mandalorian. The video wall cost upward of $1M and there are already 100 plus installed/being installed in studios around the globe and a couple of hundred more on order. Somewhere in that backlog are several huge virtual sets for Sony Pictures. And speaking of production, obviously almost every project has been produced by creative teams using the cloud and collaborative work tools.