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Friday, August 21, 2015

DStv COUSIN SHOWMAX TO HEAD OFF NETFLIX'S ENTRY

Content giant Naspers, which owns Multichoice, has launched a video on demand (VoD) service that is seen as a first strike against the impending arrival of streaming giant, Netflix.

ShowMax to be ran separately from Multichoice, will allow unlimited online streaming of movies and videos for a flat monthly fee.

The service has first been launched in South Africa but given that rival Netflix has continental ambitions, it is expected that ShowMax will ride on Multichoice's vast network on the continent to rapidly roll out.

For Kenya this could be interesting as Safaricom already has a similar service that has yet to gain traction and is said to be looking to improve on its BigBox with a second upgraded version of the same said to be under construction.

However, Safaricom is not quite interested in content as it is in uptake of its LTE service and suggestions have been made that products like ShowMax could partner with Safaricom as they can provide the content while the telco provides the infrastructure for streaming.

Currently, a visit to Showmax.com gives this notice: Sorry, ShowMax is not available in your country yet. Enter your email and we'll let you know as soon as ShowMax is available.

This suggests the rollout is imminent. ShowMax claims to have over 10,000 hours of content implying streaming 24/7 would keep you glued to your laptop or phone until November 2016.

It is not known if Zuku will be introducing such a service but Jamii Telecom (JTL) has always toyed with IPTV and streaming-like services which it has yet to bring to market.

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