Univision: Single series channels and live sport are the most successful experiences of Prende TV

Single series channels (channels dedicated to a series or show) and live sports broadcasting have been two of the most successful experiences to date in these first almost five months of Univision’s AVOD Prende TV platform.

“Single series channels are something we are exploring more and more. They are audiences that enjoy the whole series content and don’t want to watch only a particular episode,” said Rafael Urbina, EVP, and general manager of AVOD fo Univision.

Regarding live sports, he said: “We launched 40 live Eurocup games on PrendeTV, and it was an absolute success. We had very high audiences and we saw a super accelerated growth during the Eurocopa thanks to this experience of doing live sports in streaming, which is something that at a Hispanic level had not been done on that scale,” he commented.

As a balance, Urbina indicated that the platform, which was launched with 40 linear channels and 10,000 hours on-demand (less than half made up of Televisa and Univision libraries and the rest from the platform’s content partners), will reach 70 channels, aiming for 100 by the end of the year and 20 thousand hours on-demand, of which more than 60% now come from PrendeTV’s content partners, “which is very positive for the diversification of the offer,” he said.

“Historically we have been limited in traditional TV due to distribution capacity. Today, having 100 streaming channels allows us to go deeper into the areas of interest of the Hispanic market and that is exactly what we are trying to do, to diversify the content offering much more,” he explained.

Urbina, addressing providers, said: “We are looking for programming in practically all categories -from Turkish novels to comedies- where we see that there may be interesting content that generates audience -even if it is a micro audience- but that is loyal in streaming, that it is our business to add content that in turn can add interesting audiences.”

Referring to advertisers, he highlighted that the base has grown a lot and they hope to reach a higher figure than 50 advertisers by the end of 2021. “I saw a lot of interest in Prende during the Univision Upfront, which helps us and gives us visibility to continue investing in improving the content offer,” he added.

At the moment, Urbina did not provide figures regarding current users because they are working with Comscore and Nielsen and will provide official data produced by one of these services.