U.S. HISPANIC
Small and medium cable operators focus on connectivity
Maribel Ramos-Weiner| 21 de junio de 2023
Panel TV paga Nextv 2023
The VMVPDs panel: The future of pay TV? conducted at Nextv Series South America highlighted that small and medium cable operators are focusing on connectivity.
“Today the service is Internet and TV and mobile are an added value. It’s hard, but that’s how it is,” said Miguel Factor, COO of Colsecor, an association made up of Argentine cooperatives and SMEs. He also emphasized that Colsecor’s Sensa OTT service has managed to adapt to the differences in final bandwidth, which favors distribution to the extent that they began in Argentina and are already expanding to other South American countries.
He pointed out that for Colsecor the local channel is important since it attracts a large audience, but it is expensive. That is why they are considering to rethink their monetization. The goal is to offer programmatic advertising that can be displayed around the 80 locations that Colsecor associates reaches.
Lucio Gamaleri, President of Red Intercable, said that they have been working 25 years on standardizing the service offered by their partners. The agreement to offer Flow, sealed some time ago, is in that line. “It gives us added value in terms of content, usability, infrastructure and scale. We provide reach to remote locations because our goal is offer these audiences the same service as in the capital,” he commented. He also emphasized that they are focused on connectivity and on changing the mentality of the cable operator, who must understand that the service is now different.
Arnault Lannuzel, VP Sales for LatAm and Southern Europe at Broadpeak, noted that what drives transformation is what the user demands: more content, more flexibility, more devices to view the content, more filter options, more quality of experience. “Audience growth increases traffic and you can’t increase the cost along with audience growth. So technology providers have a central role in helping the operator deal with this increase in traffic, especially at sporting events, to ensure the quality of the experience.”
He highlighted that, unlike what happened years ago, now advertising can no longer only be monetized by the owner of the content, but also by the operator who is aware of the consumption habits of users. “KPIs are more valuable than cookies and enable targeted advertising.”
Cristian Cárcamo, Head of Television Engineering, GTD Chile, whose GTD TV service began as IPTV and now offers OTT, explained that they currently provide both services in order to avoid losing customers. “IPTV customers have the same offer as OTT customers and, in addition, they have the possibility of subscribing to OTT at a marginal price. The purpose is not to lose them.”
GTD TV is available on smart TVs. “Android, followed by Samsung and LG are our strengths,” said Cárcamo. And he added: “Smart TV apps have to be built correctly, otherwise the user experience is not good and the app suffers. It’s a constant challenge.”
