Nordic Entertainment Group (NENT) intends to expand the European footprint of its Viaplay streaming service with launches in the UK, Germany, Austria and Switzerland.
The company said it is targeting a global subscription base of 12 million by the end of 2025, of which approximately six million are now expected to come from international markets.
Viaplay will launch in the UK in the second half of 2022 and then in Germany, Austria and Switzerland during 2023.
By that point, the streamer will be available in a total of 16 countries, compared with the original target of 15 announced in November 2020.
The European expansion follows the company’s original international push. In November 2020 it initially announced plans to launch Viaplay in 10 international markets by 2023, including Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland and the United States during 2021.
Anders Jensen, NENT Group president and CEO said: “We have stepped up the pace and scale of Viaplay’s international expansion. We have acquired virtually all of the international sports rights that we targeted and for multiple cycles in several cases; added one more market to our roll-out ambition; signed innovative partnership agreements; and raised the bar when it comes to our investments in original content. As a result, we are increasing our subscriber and revenue growth targets, as well as our target profitability levels.
“We are investing more short term to create even higher long term returns due to the considerable operating leverage that this creates,” added Jensen. “We are investing in this growth right now, in order to capitalise on the opportunity created as the shift to streaming video consumption continues to accelerate, and demand for high quality and locally relevant stories increases.”
