Southeast Asia video streaming service Iflix gets $90m
Iflix, a primarily Southeast Asia-focused video streaming service that follows a similar business model to Netflix, has raised $90 million in Series B funding led by Liberty Global and Kuwaiti telecom company Zain Group.
Several existing investors also re-upped, including European broadcaster Sky, which led Iflix’s Series A in March 2016, contributing $45 million out of a $50 million round at a post-money valuation of $450 million. Other commitments came from Evolution Media Capital (EMC), a entertainment-focused advisor and investor backed by TPG Capital and Creative Artists Agency (CAA), and Catcha Group.
Catcha, a holding company for internet-related investments, launched Iflix in March 2015 with assistance from EMC. This was soon followed by a $30 million pre-Series A round provided by Catcha, Jungle Ventures and Philippines telecom provider PLDT. Indonesian media company Emtek Group is also an investor, having come in alongside Sky.
Based in Malaysia, Iflix expanded into the Philippines and Thailand within its first nine months, signing up more than two million subscribers. It is now also present in Indonesia, Brunei, Sri Lanka, Pakistan, the Maldives, and Vietnam, and claims five million registered users, more than Netflix has in Southeast Asia, according to analysts cited by Bloomberg. The company has entered Saudi Arabia and wants to deepen its penetration of the Middle East and Africa.
Iflix offers subscription-based video-on-demand services customized for emerging markets. The model has three core characteristics: affordability – a monthly subscription in Malaysia costs less than $2, one quarter of the price charged by Netflix in many markets; a combination of local and global content – the company has over 170 content relationships; and multi-platform – Iflix is mobile-first and designed to perform on lower-end devices.
“There are currently more than 2.5 billion people with smart phones in emerging markets who have a passion for cultural influences from around the globe and want access to the best entertainment content available easily and reliably,” Mark Britt, co-founder and group CEO of Iflix, said in a statement.
The company has previously projected that the number of smart phone users and households with fixed line broadband in Southeast Asia will surpass 240 million and 55 million, respectively, by 2018. Up to one third of smart phone users in the region are already thought to use their devices to watch long-form videos. Iflix has since predicted that the number of connected mobile devices in Africa and the Middle East will number 880 million by 2020.
In addition to Netflix, the company faces competition in Southeast Asia from overt-the-top (OTT) movie and TV services such as Hooq, which was established in 2015 by Singtel, Sony Pictures Television and Warner Bros. Entertainment.
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