by Thinus Ferreira
Disney+ will launch within a few months in another 42 countries including South Africa, Algeria, Egypt, Libya, Morocco, Tunisia and St. Helena the video streaming service confirmed on Wednesday.
As the most developed and sophisticated video streaming market in Africa, South Africa is the first and only country in sub-Saharan Africa to get Disney+, with the streaming service also launching this year in Algeria, Egypt, Libya, Morocco and Tunisia in North Africa.
St. Helena, part of the British Overseas Territory in the South Atlantic Ocean is also getting Disney+ this winter.
The Walt Disney Company announced in August 2021 that Disney+ will be launching in South Africa from around June 2022.
The past two years South African video consumers have been extremely vocal about being excluded from access to Disney+ as the Mouse House launched its streamer in the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, Australia and other comparable markets.
Meanwhile, South African consumers have been snapping up Disney-branded merchandise from content only available on Disney+, showing a high awareness and brand recognition of shows and characters like The Mandalorian, likely due to pirate viewing of Disney+ content in the territory.
On Wednesday Disney confirmed that Disney+ will launch in 42 countries and 11 new territories this winter that will include South Africa where Netflix, MultiChoice's Showmax, Amazon Prime Video and Apple TV+ are competing for scale and subscribers.
Netflix SA, MultiChoice, Amazon Prime Video and Apple TV+ are all ramping up investment and their plans to increase their local market presence in South Africa and across sub-Saharan Africa as they try to snap up video consumers and to get them to sample their subscription video-on-demand (SVOD) services.
With the oversaturated American market, streamers like Netflix as well as ones that haven't yet launched in South Africa like Disney+, WarnerMedia's HBO Max, ViacomCBS' Paramount+, NBCUniversal's Peacock, Discovery+ and others, are finally feeling the pressure to look internationally to expand their subscriber bases.
There is no firm date yet for the launch of Disney+ in South Africa this winter, but it will be any time from June.
Disney is also staying tight-lipped about the cost, although it's likely that The Walt Disney Company will try to make a splash as a late-market entry in South Africa, and to quickly gain ground on Netflix SA and Showmax with an introductory price offer that would undercut and come in below the current Netflix and Showmax pricing.
The full list of countries that Disney+ will launch in this winter include:
1. Albania
2. Algeria
3. Andorra
4. Bahrain
5. Bosnia and Herzegovina
6. Bulgaria
7. Croatia
8. Czech Republic
9. Egypt
10. Estonia
11. Greece
12. Hungary
13. Iraq
14. Israel
15. Jordan
16. Kosovo
17. Kuwait
18. Latvia
19. Lebanon
20. Libya
21. Liechtenstein
22. Lithuania
23. Malta
24. Montenegro
25. Morocco
26. North Macedonia
27. Oman
28. Palestine
29. Poland
30. Qatar
31. Romania
32. San Marino
33. Saudi Arabia
34. Serbia
35. Slovakia
36. Slovenia
37. South Africa
38. Tunisia
39. Turkey
40. United Arab Emirates
41. Vatican City
42. Yemen
