Hong Kong, 27th October – The annual CASBAA Convention kicked off today
in its new home at the Intercontinental Hotel, Hong Kong. The two-day
convention, with the theme ‘Making Waves’ brought together key industry
players in the broadcast, cable and satellite industry to discuss and debate
the hottest topics and latest developments in the industry today. With the
introduction of OTT and digital broadcast services now an established fact,
key themes of the day focused on creating quality and relevant content, as
well as localization, agile distribution and protection of content.
To kick-start the day, Chief Secretary for Administration for the Hong Kong
SAR Government, Carrie Lam, gave an introductory speech where she
underscored that the Rule of Law and freedom of expression were vital to the
fundamental strength of the HK broadcast industry. She also highlighted that
the HK SAR government believes that investing in creative talent is key to
driving growth of the creative industries and so launched the Create Smart
initiative which supports students in tertiary education focusing on TV or
media studies.
David Shing, the Digital Prophet of AOL, then looked at content consumption
from the audience perspective, highlighting how humans were at the heart of
everything and that “technology changes behavior not needs” when looking at
the key developments in the digital landscape. Also in a world where people
are creating and publishing their own content, it’s important to note that
“creativity still rules over technology” as content is now competing with
popular culture. Li Ruigang, Chairman of China Media Capital, commented
how there was huge demand from China for premium content yet “while
content is important, there is the need to build up a sustainable system to
continue to be able to create more content”. Ruigang also discussed how key
global partnerships such as Warner Bros, Dreamworks, and Legoland were
central to CMC’s strategy of establishing a solid content ecosystem. He also
took the opportunity to announce that his company is buying the China Soccer
League to further advance the company’s content and distribution strategy.
New content platforms in Asia were discussed when Janice Lee from PCCW
gave more detail on the company’s new global Viu OTT platform, announced
just yesterday. She mentioned how the company had to become extremely
agile in turning around their content in multiple languages to stay competitive
as well as beat illegal content, “Windowing has become very important, we
get our content out in multiple languages in just eight hours. Historically this
didn’t happen, which gave room for piracy.” Mike Hyun-dong Suh of CJ E&M
discussed how partnerships were also key to distribution of content, citing a
recent collaboration with Japanese app Naver as an example. He also
illustrated how taking content offline through events was also important to
engage fans. Greg Beitchman from CNN International discussed the need to
have content that worked across all their screens and that this was meeting
with success. “Digital touchpoints are enhancing our appeal rather than
cannibalizing what we do on TV,” he commented. CNNI also commented on
localization, highlighting how it had helped make them “more, not less,
relevant.”
Alon Shtruzman from Keshet Media, creator of Homeland and other key
global formats, maintains that content is, as ever, ‘king’. His company is
starting to look further afield for content and he believes ‘Asia is a goldmine
for content’ though not without some heavy legwork in understanding what
does and doesn’t work in the market.
How to engage with fans with content was discussed by Sam Rogoway, CEO,
Victorious who believed their creation of a community of superfans would
“change the way fans interact and engage with content.” The inception of the
‘passion graph’ would bring together like-minded individuals that would help
drive deeper engagement of content, even when there was no new content
available. Distribution of content was discussed by Gwynne Shotwell,
President and COO, SpaceX who’s company is investigating the feasibility of
launching 4,000 satellites into space with a view to connecting people in
remote areas throughout the planet.
Jay Samit, CEO, from SeaChange took a hard line on the future of the pay TV
business “the pay TV business as we know it is dead. The majority of content
is not linear and we need to adapt quickly or die.” With content now being
accessed increasingly online, it’s possible to work out who’s watching what at
home and provide relevant content based on that. “Pay TV will be completely
data driven,” he added. “With social analytics now shaping content offers, the
bottom line is you will go out of business if you don’t know who your consumer
is.”
Piracy of content was next on the agenda with Mark Mulready of Irdeto
showcasing just how difficult it is to distinguish legal from illegal content sites.
The Police Intellectual Property Crime Unit example from the UK, where an
infringing website list of illegal websites is published and flagged to
advertising brands, was flagged a great initiative to disrupt pirate sites.
“Through working with the advertising industry, we can remove the incoming
revenue to these illegal sites,” commented Det. Chief Supt. David Clark of
City of London Police. It was also agreed that it was everyone’s responsibility
– whether channel or creator – to protect the value of content. Are Mathisen
from Conax AS encouraged all content owners to embrace new technology to
combat content theft.
With piracy followed the issue if regulation where Ajit Pai from the US Federal
Communications Commission and R.S. Sharma from the Telecom Regulatory
Authority of India both agreeing that governments should take a less
restrictive approach to regulation to allow new business models to take shape.
A video note from UK actor and writer, James Corden, now host of the US
The Late Late Show, concluded today’s session at the convention. Corden
discussed how he saw his task was making a brilliant hour of TV every night.
“All we really want to do is make a show that is different and feels fresh every
night. If you think about it from the internet first then you will come unstuck.”
He emphasized the importance of a great creative team and how they try to
innovate with new features constantly to be as entertaining as possible.
Finally when asked if he was tired doing 44 shows a year, he commented “It’s
a luxury to be tired from doing something you love and always dreamt of.”
Sponsors for the CASBAA Convention 2015 include: ABS, Accedo, Akamai,
AMC, APT Satellite, AsiaSat, Asia Television Limited, Brightcove, Conax,
ContentWise, CreateHK, Discovery Networks Asia-Pacific, Eutelsat, France
24, Ideal Group, InvestHK, Irdeto, ITV Choice, Kantar Media, Letv, Lightning,
MEASAT, MediaExcel, One Championship, Patron Spirits, PCCW, PwC, RTL
CBS Asia, Scripps Networks Interactive, SES, TIME NOW, The University of
Chicago Booth School of Business, Time Warner, True Visions, Turner,
TV5Monde and Victorious.
For further information about the CASBAA Convention 2015, please visit
www.casbaaconvention.com.
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About CASBAA
CASBAA is the Asia Pacific region’s largest non-profit media association,
serving the multi-channel audio-visual content creation and distribution
industry. Established in 1991, CASBAA has grown with the industry to
include digital multichannel television, content, platforms, advertising, and
video delivery. Encompassing some 500 million connections within a footprint
across the region, CASBAA works to be the authoritative voice for
multichannel TV; promoting even-handed and market-friendly regulation, IP
protection and revenue growth for subscription and advertising, while
promoting global best practices. For more information, visit www.casbaa.com
—For enquiries, please contact:
Cynthia Wong
Member Relations & Marketing Director
CASBAA
Tel: +852 3929 1711
Email: cynthia@casbaa.com
Amy Chan/ Lucilla Lo
Ogilvy Public Relations
Tel: +852 2884 8421/ +852 2884 8651
Email: amy.chan@ogilvy.com / lucilla.lo@ogilvy.com