Online to Drive AsiaPac Video Revenue Gains

AsiaPac video industry revenues are expected to hit $169 billion by 2027, powered by strong gains in SVOD and AVOD revenues, per new data from Media Partners Asia (MPA) released ahead of APOS in Singapore this week.

Subscription and ad revenues from free, pay and online platforms across 14 Asia Pacific markets will hit $142.5 billion this year, MPA says, a 6.4 percent year-on-year gain. Through 2027, the sector is expected to have a 3.5 percent compound annual growth rate (CAGR), with online video growing by 8.2 percent and pay TV by 2.1 percent, while free TV will diminish by 2 percent. Excluding China, the sector will hit $98.2 billion, with an 10.2 percent CAGR for online video.

By revenues, China, Japan and India will remain the largest video markets in AsiaPac, followed by South Korea and Australia. Taiwan, currently in sixth place, will be overtaken by Indonesia by 2027. Indonesia is expected to have a 9 percent growth rate over the next five years, with India at 8.6 percent and the Philippines at 7.7 percent.

AVOD and SVOD will each have a 22 percent share of video industry revenues by 2027, MPA notes, up from 17 percent today. Free TV’s share will drop from 25 percent to 19 percent, with pay TV dropping from 40 percent to 37 percent. Excluding China, SVOD will have a 19 percent share by 2027, up from 15 percent this year, while AVOD’s share will rise from 17 percent to 24 percent.

“Free TV is by and large in secular decline; profit will continue to contract but demand for local TV content online will continue to grow, and local players will benefit from premium AVOD, an incrementally high margin business,” says Vivek Couto, executive director of MPA. “Last mile bundled home broadband and video remains a high margin business in scale markets though the full video aggregation opportunity has yet to be unlocked. In the world of online video, premium VOD platforms are exiting their initial investment phase. Profit is expected over the next one to three years and early incumbents such as Netflix are well positioned. Local content investment remains critical in scale markets while new revenue streams could develop in the future with large local online video players in India and Indonesia.”