by Thinus Ferreira
MultiChoice's video streaming service Showmax turns one year old today since it relaunched on 12 Ferbuary 2024 in partnership with Comcast's NBCUniversal and Sky and still doesn't want to release any subscriber numbers to the industry.
Showmax claims that the Showmax "2.0" subscriber base of paying customers has "increased by 50% year-on-year in the six months ended 30 September 2024" but refuses to divulge any subscriber numbers or viewership figures to substantiate any claims.
Meanwhile, the public and the industry can't get any real sense of Showmax's performance or growth due to MultiChoice's numbers secrecy.
It's therefore difficult to place or track Showmax's real growth, and the sampling and viewing of its content - what's popular, not and what has traction under viewers - compared to rivals like Netflix and traditional television like the SABC, eMedia's e.tv and even DStv which all has ratings information used by the production and advertising industries.
In a prepared quote released on Wednesday by Showmax, Byron du Plessis, MultiChoice South Africa CEO, says "Africa is a dynamic, challenging environment that remains an unrivalled growth opportunity, with the fastest-growing population globally and rising connectivity".
"Showmax is well-positioned to take advantage of these trends through its diverse mix of best-in-class local content, affordable mobile football products, and the best international content from leading international studios including NBCUniversal, HBO, Sky, Paramount and more."
Showmax constantly touts "records" and "record viewing" and "a new record" for certain content released in South Africa and Nigeria - which all means nothing when it's detached from any hard, very basic viewership and subscriber data.
Before she left, former Showmax CEO Yolisa Phahle, said that the relaunched Showmax has the aim of generating revenue of more than $1 billion after 5 years, with a trading profit break-even target in 2027.
There is absolutely no indication whether MultiChoice is managing to sign up the extremely ambitious number of new Showmax subscribers monthly in order to reach this target, whether it is behind the curve or ahead of the curve or how many subscribers it has in total, or gained per month or over the past year.
MultiChoice has pumped millions of rand over the past two years into a content funnel for Showmax to drive subscriber growth. It's however completely unclear what Showmax's content-to-subscriber conversion ratio is - especially since MultiChoice and Showmax made such an extremely ambitious aim and claim of where it wants to be in half a decade with Showmax revenue generation.
