European Broadcasters’ Journey Into the Streaming Era
In 2022, Reed Hastings painted a dark future for linear TV by predicting its death within 5–10 years (quite the ballpark). Within our industry, reactions flooded in, and opinions diverged widely, from “Social media, shortform videos, and Gen Z’s low attention spans will kill TV” to “YouTube will eat the world and be the new TV.”
As often happens, the truth sits in the middle. Linear TV faces a structural decline in weekly reach (80.4% in 2022, down 5.9% versus 2017) and viewership (3 hours, 22 minutes of daily viewing time in 2022, down 14 minutes from 2017) while its audience ages. (Young viewers only spent 1 hour, 18 minutes per day in 2022, down 28 minutes from 2017.)
The model as we know it is running out of steam. Death isn’t around the corner, though. It simply calls for an extensive transformation of broadcasting businesses to survive and thrive.
Post-Pandemic Strategic Shifts
During COVID, media platforms enjoyed unprecedented growth, with a 60% increase in video consumption globally. Some streaming industry players may have thought we would forever consume content like we did during the pandemic’s peak. We didn’t. Post-pandemic, we went back to a healthier mix of media consumption (TV, streaming, social media, gaming, and audio) and work, exercise, social lives, and sleep. A correction took place (with geopolitical and economic turbulences piling on top), and it brought a sense of urgency to all.
For streamers, it was time to end the strategy of pursuing subscriber growth at all costs. The focus shifted from subscriber growth toward profitability and engagement, with metrics such as time spent on the platform becoming more critical.
For broadcasters, it was no longer effective to build extensions of their live broadcasts with on-demand services, while competitors like YouTube offered 14 billion hours of videos, and 18,000 titles on Netflix garnered 99% of all viewing on the platform. There followed a suite of platform launches by European broadcasters that demonstrated their ambition to be not just TV channels but full-fledged entertainment hubs to super-serve local audiences.
The Trends That Matter
We have now entered the streaming era of European broadcasting. Here are the five trends which I believe will further fuel the transformation of the European broadcasting landscape in 2024 and beyond.
Local Champions
For years, European audiences relied on their local broadcasters to offer them the best of local and global content. Broadcasters secured output deals to bring first viewing windows of the latest US movies and TV series combined with local acquisitions and productions. It was what some like to call the content arms dealers’ era. You have content, you licence it to players with an audience, and they build you up locally.
The launch of Netflix (and the subsequent launch of global streaming services from other US studios) brought our industry into the direct-to-consumer era. It is one in which rightsholders launch their own streaming services and keep their content to themselves.
For broadcasters, it meant they weren’t the only option for watching the latest season of Grey’s Anatomy or Game of Thrones. Rethinking their value proposition, they embraced their status as local and culturally relevant champions at a time when streamers were mostly offering global content. A great example of that is ProSiebenSat1’s announcement in December 2023 that it would terminate its US studio output deals and focus on exclusive local content as well as a cherry-picking approach for US content.
“We are now taking the next strategic step,” Bert Habets, CEO of ProSiebenSat.1, announced at the time, “and will invest significantly more in local content from 2024, offering our viewers a unique programming experience to serve very different media usage interests and, above
all, to differentiate ourselves from the competitors of Joyn.”
Platform Excellence
Delivering locally relevant content is Step 1 in becoming a local champion. What matters more is how you make that content available and where. Initially, broadcasters created digital equivalents of their traditional linear businesses. ITV Hub, BBC iPlayer, MyTF1, and M6 Replay began as extensions, not destination hubs. Today, these next-generation services (BBC iPlayer, Joyn, ITVX, RTL+, TF1+, and M6+) are content destinations in their own right. The platforms are built to cater to all viewing experiences (linear, on-demand) and all business models (ad-supported, premium) across as many distribution outlets as possible (web, mobile, CTV, pay TV, etc.).
Broadcasters must continue to focus on matching and surpassing the platform excellence from market leaders such as Netflix, Disney+, or YouTube. As local platforms, their edge lies again in their ability to understand and adapt to local tastes and habits. They should continue innovating in features such as the ones recently launched by TF1+: SYNCHRO and TOP CHRONO.
SYNCHRO has been designed to answer the question families ask themselves every day: “What are we watching tonight?” It uses the viewing habits of each member of the family to create personalised profiles. The algorithm then takes into account the age, tastes, and desires of each member to suggest programmes that will appeal to everyone.
Personalized content recommendations with TF1+ Synchro
With TOP CHRONO, viewers can choose to receive a tailor-made summary according to the time they have available (5, 10, or 15 minutes) after major sporting competitions, as was the case during the 2023 Rugby World Cup and Euro 2024.
Match summaries provided by TF1+ Top Chrono
Enhanced Viewing Experience
While Netflix experiments with live events, broadcasters know live like the back of their hands and can take the viewing experience one step further, with fan engagement integrations that include live game statistics, social media content, watch parties, and content commerce. All of these features provide the interactivity so craved on social media platforms to the big screen.
Super Aggregation
Aggregation should go beyond video. For broadcasters, this means adding FAST channels as well as programmes and services from adjacent media verticals.
Time is of the essence, though. There’s no need to build everything from scratch, especially when it falls outside of your zone of genius. Broadcasters have multifaceted businesses which can operate in silos when all forces should come together to bring additional value to consumers. RTL+ understood this early on and brought everything under one roof: video, music, podcasts, audiobooks, concert tickets,
and magazines.
Alternatively, broadcasters should have a partnership strategy with third-party experts like M6+ did with Hayu around reality TV hits like The Kardashians or with the music festival Tomorrowland.
Tomorrowland 2024 on M6+
With 80.4% of Europeans reached weekly, European broadcasters could compete to become one-stop shops where consumers have an easy way to enjoy content across a wide range of services and verticals, facilitated by a single interface one can easily navigate. Competition is fierce in the aggregation space, though, as telecom operators, Big Tech, and CTV platforms all aspire to build ecosystems which foster choice, ease of use, and flexibility and ultimately own the direct customer relationship.
Advertising Edge
Last but not least, broadcasters in Europe are heavyweights when it comes to advertising (with 24.8 billion of advertising revenues on Free to Air TV in 2023). With the exception of Amazon (which gained instant scale with the launch of Prime Video with ads), streamers are still in the process of building their ad-supported subscriber business. This gives an edge to local broadcasters, but one they shouldn’t sit on for too long. US companies have been known for playing catch-up.
Growing audiences on linear TV, BVOD, addressable TV, and CTV is one thing. Facilitating buying and measurement across all screens is another. Planet V in the UK (since 2020), and more recently, the RTL Deutschland and ad-tech partnership, aim to do just that.
Bringing together the content and services of each group’s ad-tech company, smartclip and Virtual Minds, advertisers can run campaigns spanning the two partners’ platforms, ranging from linear TV to smart TV advertising and campaigns on the RTL+ and Joyn streaming platforms. Following the launch of this partnership in the DACH region (Germany, Austria, and Switzerland), the partners plan to expand rapidly into other European countries.
“By cooperating in this way, ProSiebenSat.1 and RTL Deutschland are laying the foundations for full-stack ad tech that is made in Europe,” says Seven.One Media CEO Carsten Schwecke. “Both companies invested in advertising technology early on, with the most effective medium, TV, undergoing a process of comprehensive digitalisation. In the future, technology based on artificial intelligence will further improve the efficiency of linear and digital advertising. This will make booking innovative, cross-platform TV campaigns easier and more efficient for both advertisers and agencies.”
What’s Next
This brings me to the biggest opportunity and challenge for broadcasters: their ability to work together.
In that respect, UK broadcasters (BBC, ITV, Channel 4, and Channel 5) are no strangers to joint ventures, and their latest initiative brought us Freely. They have been collaborating for the past 20 years to protect their market share and prominence in the local audiovisual market. They do so by pushing their agenda with policymaking (such as the UK Media Bill that passed the House of Lords in May) and by innovating with platforms like Freely.
The UK is an outlier in the European broadcasting landscape, as few European markets managed to have this level of collaboration for so long. We’ve witnessed several collaborative initiatives in eu5 markets.
In Germany, ARD and ZDF teamed up in 2023 for a combined platform, but in the back end, it is still two discrete technology stacks. Joyn, a German Hulu-like offering from commercial broadcaster ProSiebenSat.1, built a solid lineup of channels (including ARD and ZDF), but failed to attract RTL, Germany’s other commercial broadcaster.
French players TF1, M6, and France Télévisions tried with Salto (which closed in March 2023), then went the merger route (M?+TF?) without success.
In Spain, LOVEStv is a 5-year-old HbbTV cooperation among RTVE, Atresmedia, and Mediaset España.
In Italy, Tivù srl—a joint venture among Rai, Mediaset, and Telecom Italia—launched tivùsat in 2009 in 3 million households.
Working alone to challenge Big Tech, Netflix, and US studios seems untenable long term. It’s far more effective to turn competitors into partners.
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