Well, it’s official. Quibi, after 6 months since coming online, has to close shop. This initially 1.8 billion dollar valued company had to pull the plug due to a lack of subscription activity (based on the capital invested). In a world where newer and better usually beats the older and reliable after enough time has passed, “nature” actually fought against the “natural selection” of OTT streaming platforms. Nonetheless, OTTs such as Netflix, Amazon and Disney will be looking to copy the techniques of the now defunct Quibi, just like how Facebook, Watsapp and Instagram copied off the social media giant Snapchat (even if some may deny it).
Quibi was a company founded back in 2018, with revolutionary new ideas by it’s creator Jeff Katzenberg and was led by Meg Whitman, it’s CEO. It was named NewTV back then but then changed it to Quibi in October 2020. The service was meant to target a younger demographic with it’s 10 minute episodes, “quick bites”. It was also aimed to be a mobile-phone only OTT streaming platform, which can be viewed in 16:9 and 9:16 aspect ratios, while the user is on the go.
But for this type of viewing, Quibi needed to create their own original content …and lot’s of it, if they need to keep customers interested. But with this idea quickly catching on among investors, securing funds became easy as the big names came calling. By the end of 2018, Quibi raised 1 billion US Dollars in funding from major Hollywood film studios and Television companies among other investors including The Walt Disney Company, 21st Century Fox, Sony Pictures, MGM, Goldman Sachs, JPMorgan Chase and Alibaba Group among many others.
The company launched the app on April 2020, which had released around 100 “quick bite” shows featuring an array of popular actors including Christop Waltz, Liam Hemsworth, Sophie Turner, Anna Kendrick, Chrissy Teigen, Morpheus …sorry Lawrence Fishburne, Kevin Hart, Jennifer Lopez and Kristen Bell to mention a “few”. It had two packages released on launch, a 5 dollar with ads subscription and a 8 dollar without ads version. It launched in the US and Canada while also launching ad-free in the UK, Ireland, and Australia on the same day.
On paper, this was a brilliant launch, especially after it’s epic ad campaign where it featured during the Superbowl and Oscars, spending over 63.7 million dollars on the promotion alone. But the pandemic struck and nearly every plan of Quibi’s derailed. This OTT was created for the younger audience, who were regularly on the go and the 10 minute gaps they had while waiting in lines, on buses or trains, etc. could be filled up by these “quick bites” episodes.
But with the pandemic happening, and lockdowns stopping people from leaving their homes, people wanted more, longer content to pass their time. True Netflix, Amazon Prime Video and Disney+ may be more expensive, but their libraries are extensive (spanning the globe) and have longer content. So “not-unexpectedly”, Quibi quickly dropped from its spot of “The 50 most downloaded free apps” within a week after it’s launch. By May, its rank was 125th and by June, its rank had fallen below the 1000s.
But this app has proved that this idea can still work. Without it’s launch in bigger markets such as India and Brazil, Quibi still managed to receive 1.3 million active users during this 6 month time period. This is something all major OTT streaming platforms should be keeping an eye on. This shows that Katzenberg’s idea still works and they should either try adding some of the features from Quibi with Katzenberg brought on as a consultant or buy the app and it’s content.
We do not know what might have happened if Quibi had opened 2 years ago or 2 years from now. It might have died a little later, or it could have been the next OTT giant like when Instagram was taking on Facebook. Either way, we may never know. But any company not seeing the potential behind this OTT idea is staring at the end of the road of Google’s Orkut.
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