PremiumNEW DELHI: Disney+, the video streaming service owned by Walt Disney Co. said Hotstar accounted for nearly 40% of its overall subscriber base at the end of the April-June quarter. Disney+ has reported 116 million paid subscribers globally, so Hotstar users would be around 46 million. The additions also came from Malaysia and Thailand where Hotstar launched this quarter, and from India and Indonesia where the service is already present.
In May, Disney+ had reported 104 million global subscribers with around 34 million coming from Hotstar.
“When you think about Disney+ Hotstar, IPL (Indian Premiere League) is certainly a very important component of the offerings, but we also have a very broad portfolio of general entertainment (shows and movies) as well as other sports. It has a lot of original...as well as library content from all of the Disney+ brands and IPs. And we’ve added over 18,000 of original local programming every year," Christine McCarthy, senior executive vice-president and chief financial officer at Disney, said during an earnings call.
To be sure, Disney+ Hotstar's average monthly revenue per paid subscriber is significantly lower than the average monthly revenue per paid subscriber for Disney+ in other markets, the company said in a statement. ARPU for Disney+ decreased to $4.16 from $4.62 due to a higher mix of Disney+ Hotstar subscribers in the current quarter compared to the year-ago period, partially offset by a lower mix of wholesale subscribers and increases in retail pricing. “Disney+ Hotstar ARPU also increased from Q2 to Q3 due to higher ad revenue per subscriber, reflecting the roughly four weeks of IPL matches that were played in Q3 versus none in Q2," McCarthy added. The IPL will return this September, she said.
Building on the need to cater to a price-sensitive market like India, Disney+ Hotstar had announced a new range of price plans, including a mobile-only plan for Rs. 499 per year last month.
Hotstar was earlier priced at Rs399 per annum for its VIP service and Rs1,499 for Premium. The Walt Disney-owned VoD platform became the third foreign service to introduce a mobile-only plan for India after Netflix that had launched a mobile subscription priced at Rs199 per month in 2019, and Amazon Prime Video whose membership can be accessed by Airtel pre-paid customers starting at Rs89 a month. Sunil Rayan, president and head, Disney+ Hotstar had said in an earlier interview to Mint that the company isn't worried about low ARPU from markets like India but instead chooses to focus on what the local population can afford.
“We want to appeal to middle India in a big way and our content choices and investments have to be mainstream (for that)," Gaurav Banerjee, president and head, Hindi and English Entertainment, Star India had said at the launch of the platform’s latest slate of originals. Titles included actor Ajay Devgn’s OTT debut Rudra-The Edge of Darkness, historical drama called The Empire starring Shabana Azmi and Kunal Kapoor, medical drama Human starring Shefali Shah and Kirti Kulhari, the second season of family crime drama Aarya, among others.
Disney CEO Bob Chapek said during the earnings call that the company’s upcoming theatrical slate includes live-action musical West Side Story from Steven Spielberg, spy film The King’s Man besides sequels to Doctor Strange, Thor and Black Panther.
“In light of the prolonged and unpredictable nature of the pandemic, we needed to find alternative ways to bring our movies to consumers while theatres were closed. And once they began to reopen, there was still widespread reluctance to return. Therefore, we adopted a three-pronged strategy for releasing our films that consisted of theatrical releases, direct to Disney+ and a hybrid of theatrical plus premier access as we did with Cruella, Jungle Cruise and Marvel’s Black Widow," Chapek said.
“We will continue to utilize all available options going forward, learn from insights gained with each release and innovate accordingly, while always doing what we believe is in the best interest of the film and the best interest of our constituents," he added.
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