European pay-TV provider Canal+ has taken a 26.1% stake in Viu, the over-the-top (OTT) video service offered by Hong Kong’s PCCW.
Canal+’s investment of US$300 million includes an initial investment of US$200 million with the option of increasing Canal+’s stake in Viu to 51%. According to PCCW, the inclusion of Canal+ as a strategic investor is recognition of Viu’s current position in the video streaming markets it is servicing. Viu currently boasts 66 million monthly active users and 12 million paid subscribers.
For Canal+, the investment in Viu offers the opportunity to expand its presence in Asia, as Maxime Saada, Group CEO, Canal+, explained, “Canal+ already has leading market positions in Europe and Africa. We are now looking forward to developing Asia as an additional growth engine for the group. Our investment in Viu is a major step towards achieving this goal.
“Viu is already a business with scale, with its hybrid advertising-based video-on-demand (AVoD) and subscription video-on-demand (SVoD) business model and focus on local content, it has all the ingredients to deliver superior growth and continue to be a leading service in the region and beyond.”
According to the companies, the new strategic partnership is designed to enable the further growth of Viu, using the global strength and expertise of Canal+ through various initiatives including collaboration on premium productions and content creation, expansion of global market reach for Viu, and continual user experience improvement.