Hannah Blyth, head of TV at Prime Video in the U.K., and Kai Finke, chief content officer at SkyShowtime, outlined new approaches to windowing and collaboration at a MIP London session today called “What Do Streamers Want?”
The session was moderated by Jack Davison, the executive VP of 3Vision, who prefaced the conversation with some of the company’s own research on streamer content trends.
“They want subscribers and profitability!” Davison quipped. “They want viewers and reach,” he said, referencing the evolution of ad tiers on streaming services. “And they need to survive the new market landscape, where everyone is operating under constrained finances.”
With the commissioning downturn, Davison pointed to gains in third-party acquisitions at the streamers. He also referenced a shift away from the studios keeping all of their catalog titles for their own platforms and pointed to a “significant jump” in second-window acquisitions by free-TV broadcasters.
“This reflects a great effort by people to find more synergies, find more partnerships, to make it work in a more challenging financial market.”
Innovative partnerships, the rising importance of sports and live events, deep libraries and engagement across social media are all key priorities for streamers, Davison said before beginning his conversation with Blyth and Finke about their content strategies.
Blyth heads up TV for Prime Video UK, encompassing “everything that is not global all-rights titles. I focus on a local level. Everything from finished tape acquisitions, co-productions, prebuys and commissioning for U.K. rights across scripted and unscripted.”
Finke leads content at pan-European streamer SkyShowtime, which has a footprint in 22 countries. “That includes our relationship with shareholders Paramount Global and Comcast. That provides us a pipeline from Paramount Pictures, Universal Pictures, Sky, Showtime and others. We also commissioning originals.”
Answering the question of what streamers want from the Prime Video UK perspective, Blyth noted, “We always look three years in advance. And we’re looking not just at the SVOD service but at Prime Video as a whole, so that’s our live sports, our channels, TVOD and home entertainment. We want to have a balanced slate. Do we have a good volume and cadence of content for our core audiences.”
Finke said that SkyShowtime is focused on growing its market share given its relatively recent entrance to the market. “We want to present ourselves as a great destination for fostering storytellers across our footprint. We want to be a great partner and an asset in the entertainment and creative industries and create a great content portfolio for our audiences.”
Amid this time of “content austerity,” as Davison put it, “windowing is a real opportunity to build audiences,” Finke said. “We need to look at the creativity of the collaborative approach and financing projects together and building audiences together. We are in growth mode. We are investing. We’re trying to find a big, meaningful audience for the great movies and TV shows from both of our shareholders. We’re looking for projects that we can potentially do together with partners.”
Blyth stressed the importance of being flexible. She is still acquiring finished tape for the U.K. and is looking at opportunities to invest early in projects. She refenced as an example Kill Jackie. “We came on board for the U.K. and Ireland,” with other territories boarding the Fremantle crime thriller later.
On exclusivity and shared windows, Blyth noted, “In Spain, my counterparts share a first-run window with a local player. In the U.K., we haven’t done that. It’s a quite mature market, so there is more overlap in viewership. Everyone wants that exclusivity. But there are opportunities to do co-productions internationally. I would co-produce with a U.S. partner. It doesn’t necessarily have to be Prime Video. Prime Video has co-produced with the BBC.”
“Big, broad, commercial, mainstream content” is resonating with SkyShowtime subs, Finke noted, including the hit Yellowstone and the Star Trek franchise. “Throughout our footprint, we are making available the great programming pipeline from both of our shareholders. In order to program your services effectively, you also need to provide local authenticity. That’s what we’re looking for in some of our shows. We have commissioned shows throughout our footprint.”
Blyth said a key priority for her is making sure the slate is balanced, including serving female and younger demos. “That might be through quite targeted shows. Molly-Mae: Behind It All is a really good example of this. That drove a lot of acquisition of younger female audiences. We’re also looking at ways of broadening out other titles. In the scripted space, we might still do a kind of action thriller or crime thriller, but find ways to ensure that it’s broad.”
In sports programming, meanwhile, the focus is on “popular teams and making sure that we’re catering to that audience.”
Finke is focused on catering to its existing audience “and then organically growing into a broader audience from there.”
On trends they’re keeping an eye on, Blyth referenced intersections with the creator economy, including Mr. Beast’s Beast Games series on Prime Video globally and Molly-Mae: Behind It All on the local level. “These influencers have very engaged, very loyal fanbases, but it still needs to be compelling content that makes sense as long-form and makes sense for us as a service. It’s not a one size fits all. Some of our scripted shows will cast influencers and content creators. We’re always looking at ways to engage with existing fanbases, but you have to do it in a way that’s authentic and makes sense.”
Finke stressed the importance of collaboration today. “We’ve been collaborating closely with MVPD partners and telcos across our footprint. That’s been incredibly important for us in getting the service off the ground. We are collaborating with our shareholders and figuring out the best approach to finding a big European audience for their content. And we’re collaborating with European storytellers. In 2025, we want to remain committed to our partners and our audiences.”
