Paramount Global[a] (doing business as Paramount,[5] formerly as ViacomCBS) is an American multinational mass media and entertainment conglomerate controlled by National Amusements and headquartered at One Astor Plaza in Midtown Manhattan in New York City. The company was formed on December 4, 2019, as ViacomCBS Inc. through the merger of the second incarnations of CBS Corporation and Viacom[6] (which were split from the original Viacom on December 31, 2005). The company changed its name to Paramount Global on February 16, 2022, the day after its Q4 earnings presentation.[7]
Paramount's main properties include the namesake Paramount Pictures film and television studio, the CBS Entertainment Group (consisting of the CBS television network, television stations, BET Networks, (who owns the BET and VH1 channels, among others), and other CBS-branded assets), media networks (consisting of U.S.-based cable television networks including MTV, Nickelodeon, Comedy Central, CMT, Paramount Network, and Showtime) and the company's streaming services (including Paramount+ and Pluto TV). It also has an international division that manages international versions of its pay TV networks, as well as region-specific assets including Argentina's Telefe, Chile's Chilevisión, India's Colors, the United Kingdom's Channel 5, and Australia's Network 10. Between 2011 and 2023, the division also owned a 30% stake in the Rainbow S.p.A. studio.[8]
As of 2019, the company operates over 170 networks and reaches approximately 700 million subscribers in 180 countries.[9]
He tells the BBC the lack of affordable and reliable broadband access and internet piracy are also significant hurdles for companies that want to sell video on-demand.
However, he is optimistic: "I think the future is bright for Africa because they have a lot of things that other markets, such Europe and America, don't.
"In the coming years, they will have 400-500 million new young tech-savvy customers who are new potential users and subscribers."
MultiChoice's Showmax hopes to take advantage of this by using new streaming technology, in a partnership with NBCUniversal and Sky, and is also partnering with mobile phone company MTN South Africa to make streaming services more accessible with data bundle offers.
Over the next 12 months Showmax says it will launch more than 1,300 hours of original programming - a 150% increase in production output compared to the year before.
With 70% of sub-Saharan Africans aged under 30, Showmax, which also offers documentaries and Premier League football, wants to expand its market share in the African subscription video-on-demand space.
Other global streaming giants such as Amazon Prime are reducing their investment in Africa and have cut jobs on the continent and restructured to focus on the European market.
But Showmax, owned by the MultiChoice group - one of the continent's biggest pay TV operators - is doing the opposite by ramping up production with 21 new original African shows recently released.
Its chief executive Marc Jury says the target for their parent company, with millions of dollars of investment in new productions, is to expand to 50 million consumers across the African continent by 2028: "Our ambition is to be the number one streaming platform in Africa."
Rival streamer Netflix has also been steadily expanding its presence in Africa's video streaming market. Between 2016 and 2022, it invested $175m (£139m) in South Africa, Nigeria and Kenya.
In 2020, it also signed a lucrative multi-title deal with Nigerian production company EbonyLife, founded by acclaimed producer Mo Abudu, to create multiple original Netflix series and films.
Revenge thriller The Black Book, which it recently acquired, became the first ever Nigerian film to soar to number three on Netflix's worldwide film charts - watched by more than 20 million people in its opening weeks last year.
Netflix says it has created around 12,000 jobs on the continent and plans to continue to invest in local creative economies and support more African storytellers.
"We are still in many ways at the inception stages of our investment journey, so it's doubly exciting to know we are poised to deliver even greater impact if we maintain our current momentum," Shola Sanni, Netflix's policy director for sub-Saharan Africa, has said.
But streaming technology can face challenges in African markets.
"There are not too many flat rate plans and a single movie consumes quite a lot of data," explains Ivan Biljan, from European video streaming company UniqCast.
Among their most-anticipated new series is Red Ink, created with Bomb Productions, the company behind the Oscar-nominated film Mandela.
There is also a 10-part crime series called Catch Me a Killer starring Game of Thrones actress Charlotte Hope about South Africa's first serial killer profiler.
To enable this boost in production, MultiChoice supports a 12-month programme to develop emerging African TV and film talent through hands-on industry experience.
"When I started out, it was the first year of it," says Mfebe about his training in 2018.
"I was a camera assistant and you learn from all the different departments. I also met a lot of people that I still work with today throughout the industry."
This African-centred approach to storytelling appears to be resonating with local audiences.
In 2022, nine out of Showmax's 10 most-streamed titles in Ghana were African-produced. In Kenya, South Africa and Nigeria, the majority of the top 10 titles were also African-made.
Showmax, which for the last nine years has operated in 44 sub-Saharan countries and currently produces original series for three core markets - South Africa, Nigeria and Kenya - will unveil its first original series from Ethiopia and Tanzania later this year.
Actor Lebohang Lephatsoana, who plays Youngins character Tumelo, sums up the love being shown for the high school drama: "Africans always gun for telling authentic stories that the audience is going to relate to.
"Africans are beautiful storytellers. If anything we're storytellers from when we get born," he tells the BBC.
The performer takes to song - with the official 2010 World Cup hit by Shakira and South African group Freshly Ground - to make his point: "It's time for Africa. Tsamina mina eh eh. Waka waka eh eh."
That compares with Murray’s estimate that Netflix will hit 6.9 million subscribers in Africa then. “SVOD is a battle between Netflix and regional player Showmax,” the analyst concluded.
Showmax CEO, and MultiChoice South Africa CEO, Marc Jury has predicted “a big year” for the streamer on the back of its Monday relaunch.
In an interview with The Hollywood Reporter, Jury addressed the growth opportunity for streaming in Africa, the benefits of working with Comcast and its businesses, as well as Showmax’s increased original content budget at a time when Hollywood players are cutting back.
Showmax is a subscription video on demand service. Since launching in South Africa in 2015, the company has focused on a video entertainment product for people in historically underserved entertainment markets—places where providers such as Netflix have not yet reached. With this goal in mind, Showmax has strategically expanded into 70+ countries across Africa and Eastern Europe, amassing an extensive catalogue of original TV shows and movies.
Barron Ernst is the Chief Product Officer at Showmax, where he leads Product, Design, QA and Growth. Since he joined, Ernst has been focused on centralized teams to help drive their expansion into new markets. Each new market is unique, so it’s essential for their product and growth teams to be able to track everything they’re doing to deeply understand new users and make quick product decisions to drive adoption and retention.
“From the beginning, we wanted to democratize access to our data and then be able to quickly analyze more and more trends and dive in on many variables,” Ernst says.
Showmax switched from Mixpanel to Amplitude as their product analytics platform because they said Amplitude gives them more flexibility to mix and match variables to get a complete picture of user behavior. Amplitude also enables anyone at Showmax to pull the data that they need, whenever they need it.
The subscription video on demand service informs content strategy and global expansion decisions with Amplitude.Eight and a half years after its launch, African streaming service Showmax is ready for a bigger spotlight on the continent thanks to a relaunch powered by a joint venture with Comcast and NBCUniversal‘s Peacock streaming platform, new pricing, mobile-only offers, as well as an expanded content lineup, including popular sports and more originals to offer up the best of African and international programming. Showmax’s goals: “to change the game for streaming in Africa” and to be the “number one streamer in Africa.”
African pay-TV giant MultiChoice Group launched Showmax in South Africa before expanding to 44 countries in Sub-Saharan Africa.
Africa’s leading pay TV company, MultiChoice Group, and U.S. media powerhouse Comcast’s NBCUniversal Media are set to embark on a significant investment journey, funneling around $177 million into Showmax’s video streaming platform this year.
This financial commitment stems from a strategic partnership formed in 2023 involving MultiChoice, NBCUniversal, and Sky, aimed at a comprehensive revamp of Showmax. In line with this collaboration, MultiChoice relinquished a 30% stake in Showmax to NBCUniversal, a move reported by Reuters.
The recent disclosure outlines detailed plans for both entities to infuse an initial $30 million in equity funding into Showmax, effective today, February 2(today). Looking ahead, an additional funding injection of up to $127 million is anticipated throughout MultiChoice’s fiscal year, concluding on March 31.
MultiChoice, in its pursuit of maintaining dominance amidst stiff competition from global streaming giants like Netflix, Amazon, and Disney, strategically positions Showmax as a robust player in the streaming domain.
This competitive landscape sees players like Netflix actively investing in local content to fortify their foothold in the African market. MultiChoice’s investment strategy aligns with this trend, as it strives to elevate Showmax to a leading position in the African streaming scene.
In 2023, Showmax announced a partnership with Comcast’s NBCUniversal and Sky to enhance its content library, incorporating key international content.
The new Showmax 2.0, launched in February 2024, introduced a revamped app and streaming platform, along with an extensive content slate. Showmax’s content spans international titles from major studios like Warner Bros., Discovery, BBC, HBO, Freemantle, Sony, Banjijay, eOne, Paramount, ITV, and Lionsgate.
In 2020, Showmax acquired exclusive licensing rights to stream HBO’s content in Africa, which has become one of the biggest advantages for the company. “Although we now watch a few local shows on Showmax, my favorite shows were Billions and Curb Your Enthusiasm,” Johannesburg-based designer Mpumelelo Cindi told Rest of World.
In March 2023, Comcast — the parent company of Universal Pictures, NBC, Peacock, Sky, DreamWorks Animation, and Telemundo — bought a 30% stake in Showmax through NBCUniversal. This gave the African company access to advanced technology, the funds to survive in a competitive market, and blockbuster English-language content, including titles from the BBC, Lionsgate, ITV, Paramount, Sony, and Warner Bros.
Comcast’s presence will help further strengthen Showmax’s position, CEO Marc Jury told Rest of World. “It allows us to invest in far greater numbers of local productions, and so when you take those local productions, coupled with the international content from around the world and the best of live sport, we know that we’ve got a winner.”