iQiyi Eyes Global Expansion

Chinese video streaming giant iQiyi is steadily building an international presence, rolling out its own platform as well as a white-label service for broadcasters and content owners looking to kickstart their own OTT ambitions. Anna Pak Burdin, head of business development at iQiyi International, shares the company’s growth strategies.

iQiyi is China’s largest video platform, with 105.3 million subscribers as of March this year. Since opening its international headquarters in Singapore last year to bolster its Southeast Asian ambitions, the platform has made steady gains in key markets like Thailand, Malaysia and Indonesia. “Southeast Asia is the most natural territory for us for expansion due to the culture and language,” Pak Burdin explains.

“At its core, iQiyi’s aim is to be a home for Asian content,” she continues. “Our first focus is to build the slate of content.” That includes iQiyi’s own Chinese content, with interest building across Asia, and, of course, Korean shows, which remain dominant in large parts of the region. “We have our first Korean original coming this year,” Pak Burdin notes.

“In terms of the territories, it’s still Southeast Asia, but we’re also open for further opportunities, other territories where we can cater to local communities. The iQiyi International app and website is already available in 12 languages in terms of the UI and subtitles. Some of the content is also dubbed. We are very excited about international expansion.”

Pak Burdin points to iQiyi’s dual focuses on both tech and content, referencing the importance of viewers having a positive viewing experience at home, including the fast response time of the platform: audiences can watch shows less than two seconds after hitting the play button.

Beyond building the reach of iQiyi globally, the company is also the only major platform white-labeling its service, exporting its technology expertise via its SaaS division, with Pak Burdin and her team working on licensing to broadcasters, telcos and others a video streaming solution. “We are bringing to market an end-to-end, all-in-one solution that works with all monetization [models], for example, AVOD, SVOD, TVOD, streaming live events, or it can be a traditional 24/7 [live stream].” The SaaS division intends to lower barriers to entry for all companies eyeing expansion in the OTT space, especially linear broadcasters looking to survive and thrive in an on-demand landscape.

The Covid-19 pandemic and subsequent shutdowns saw many broadcasters looking for alternative revenue streams as the ad market took a hit, providing a clear opportunity for the iQiyi SaaS team. Of note, iQiyi’s technology powers Media Prima’s tonton CINEMA!, a TVOD platform that went live earlier this year. “In Malaysia and many other countries, the theaters were closed and the lockdown was rather extensive,” Pak Burdin notes. “Media Prima wanted to monetize its content, so they decided to launch a TVOD platform. We also have a content partnership with them. [In the TVOD deal] we give them our white-label technology. It allows Media Prima to bring the best of their content to the Malaysian audience. We provided to them an all-in-one solution, based on AI and big data.”

While lockdowns have eased in most places, Pak Burdin sees strong potential in the PVOD market, following iQiyi’s own successes in China. “PVOD is an opportunity. It’s a way to complement the theatrical earnings and experience. In China, we saw that it worked pretty well for the movie producers, for us and the audience. We cannot replicate the theatrical scale, but we see it as an opportunity to top up the revenue from the content produced. I think it will remain the same in the future. There will be consumers at ease with going to the cinema and some will prefer to stay on their couch and still watch the latest movies. For us, it’s really building the ecosystem.”

For companies thinking about whether to take an SVOD, AVOD or TVOD route—or some combination of all three—Pak Burdin says there are several factors to consider. “The first for me is the habits in the market,” she says. “You have markets where users are not used to paying [for content]. The second thing is the background of the platform. For example, for the traditional free-to-air companies entering the OTT market, it’s a big question: I was always available for free; how do make people pay now? Another one is the scale of the advertising market, the level of CPMs. If your CPMs are low, you probably want to go with a premium model.”