Naspers' subscription video-on-demand (SVOD) service ShowMax has done its first market segment service tier split since it launched in August 2015, creating a cheaper alternative branded ShowMax Select in conjunction with cellular service provider Vodacom.
ShowMax is also getting ready to launch in Poland next week, starting on 15 February 2017 with a monthly subscription of 5 euro or R70.90.
Until now ShowMax has only had one subscription "tier" costing R99 per month but is now doing its first bundling stratification to create a lower-tiered service for R49 per month its calling ShowMax Select.
ShowMax Select can only be paid for by adding the R49 to Vodacom subscribers' monthly bill while ShowMax Premium has various payment offers. ShowMax Select makes it possible for people without a credit card to get access to the SVOD player's service.
ShowMax Select as a cheaper option - the first consumer demographic delineation for the SVOD player - limits the portion of international content available in the bucket for the client.
With less international content licensing rights payable to foreign distributors and filling up with local shows - many of which is owned by through-the-wire-fence pay-TV broadcaster M-Net - ShowMax is able to lower offer a cheaper targeted product.
More than 50% of the available content on ShowMax Select is local content, resulting in the 50% cheaper price difference.
Besides the higher local content bucket, ShowMax Select is also optimised to use as little data as possible of Vodacom users who have to watch on smartphones and tablets. The default level is standard definition (SD), using almost 40% less data than ShowMax Premium.
Chris Savides, head of ShowMax Africa, says ShowMax Select costs "half the price of our existing ShowMax Premium service with a strong focus on local content. We designed ShowMax Select to be viewed first and foremost on mobile devices,with multiple options for managing data consumption".
