To Take on Wavve and Global Players
CJ ENM and JTBC announced on Sept. 17 that they signed a business agreement to set up a joint venture for over-the-top (OTT) media services. The two companies are planning to launch the joint venture and an integrated OTT platform based on CJ ENM’s TVing early next year.
CJ ENM and JTBC participate in the joint venture as the largest and second-largest shareholders, respectively. The joint venture will distribute content to local OTT platforms.
The cooperation is to strategically respond to fast-changing media market environments. OTT services such as Netflix are currently gaining popularity worldwide and Disney and Apple are working on their own OTT services.
“We will work very closely with JTBC in order to produce the best content,” CJ ENM explained, adding, “We will enhance our original OTT content, supply more target-specific external content, and make efforts so that viewers can consume such content in the most convenient way.” JTBC also said that its cooperation with CJ ENM will contribute to viewers’ content choices and the global competitiveness of the local media industry.
In the meantime, the three South Korean terrestrial broadcasting stations and SK Telecom launch their integrated OTT platform Wavve on Sept. 18. They are planning to invest a total of 300 billion won in order to get more content and are aiming to increase the number of paid subscribers to at least five million and reach 500 billion won in annual sales by 2023.