Alan Sokol Hemisphere Media Group
In 2018 Hemisphere managed to challenge the general market trends with the organic growth of their pay TV channels in the US. “We closed some important distribution agreements for our US channels, including the restructuring of Televisión Dominicana in AT&T U-verse and the launch of Cinelatino, WAPA América, Pasiones and CentroAméricaTV on DIRECTV Now. It was also a great year for PantaYA that in its first year managed to become the leader of OTT in the Spanish language in the US,” commented Alan Sokol, president, and CEO of Hemisphere Media Group.
Their television networks in the Caribbean and Latin America also accomplished great achievements. “In Puerto Rico we are proud to have finished another year as the number one station in the market. In Colombia, Canal 1 almost reached a 10% share and quadruplicated ratings compared to what they were before we renovated the programming together with our partners,” he ended.
This year, the company hopes to produce more high-quality contents with MarVista and work with Snap to distribute the increasing flow of original programming to diverse platforms in Latin America. “We are also planning to introduce series on PantaYA, which should boost the platform´s growth,” he added.
Sokol showed enthusiasm for the growth potential of his businesses in 2019, “which is superior to that of our partners in the general market, whose businesses will continue to contract in this evolving industry.”
Hemisphere aims to have an internal organization to distribute its own product, especially now that they plan to increase the original production of high manufacturing quality.
For the future, Sokol forecasts the growth of emerging platforms such as Sling and DIRECTV Now that are aimed specifically to Hispanics in the US. “Regardless of where the market is heading, being able to control our content positions us well to be able to offer TV viewers content the way they want to consume it,” he ended.
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