Matt Pollins

Olswang

Associate

The pace of change is rapid and unprecedented, and the key challenge for the TV industry lies in quickly adapting to new technologies and evolving viewer habits against the background of widespread piracy.

In an effort to track this rapid change, showcase the level of innovation in Australian TV and consider the challenges that remain, CASBAA recently co-published a report with law firm Olswang Asia entitled “Digital, Legal & Anywhere”. The full report is available on the CASBAA website but here are our top 3 talking points:

1. Australia is a great market for OTT

Australian viewers are generally young, tech-savvy and affluent. Technology infrastructure is improving (despite recent issues with the controversial rollout of the National Broadband Network) and Australia is a world-beater when it comes to mobile broadband penetration. It is fair to say that Australia is a market of early adopters.

2. Piracy in Australia remains a big problem

Piracy remains a huge challenge for the TV industry in Australia. Indeed, levels of piracy in Australia are high by any international standard. Although the Government is starting to take some initial steps to addressing the problem, there has so far been a lack of decisive action of the kind seen in comparable markets such as the UK.

3. A broad and growing range of OTT services exists – probably the best in Asia-Pacific

One of the key findings of the report is that Australia is now offering arguably the broadest range of legal content offerings in any market in Asia-Pacific, with a wide range of models and content types covered. In fact, new offerings were being launched almost monthly just during the period that the report was being written. To showcase the range of offerings available, a pilot “one stop shop” website is being launched at www.finddigitaltv.com.au. This “one stop shop” allows viewers to search for legal online TV services by category (e.g. kids, sports) and commercial model (e.g. free, download, subscription). This site builds on work that was done in Singapore last year and given that some of the findings between the two countries were the same (i.e. that there is still some scope to improve consumer awareness of legitimate content offerings available), one wonders whether this is a broader opportunity for the TV industry across Asia-Pacific.

Australia is definitely a market on the move and one to watch when it comes to the evolution of TV. Anyone interested to read more can download the report here.