SABC+ Undergoes A Major Restructure Which Sees Only TV And Radio Channels Accessible On The Platform, Archived And Third Party Programming Axed

Following SABC's acquisition of the TelkomOne streaming service from Telkom which had since then folded under SABC+. The streaming service has been struggling to garner any traction as seen with local players such as eMedia Investments' eVOD and MultiChoice's Showmax.

The SABC turned to high data prices as the cause for the little consumer consumption. Another reason would be marketing as the broadcaster hasn't invested in any exclusive content for the streamer as the latter has been viewed on their linear platforms with some third parties from Curiosity and Da Vinci.

A few months ago, SABC had removed their shows from MultiChoice's DStv Catch-up service with further content meant to reside within SABC+. 

From 1st December, SABC restructured their streaming service so much so that it doesn't look like a competitor to a majority of existing streaming services available in the market but to only DStv Stream which serves as a wireless version to the current linear platform.

It only features SABC 1-3, SABC Education, SABC Sport, SABC News and SABC Lehae alongside the 19 radio stations. There's currently no catch-up not even a section to view third party shows from Curiosity or an archived section for past SABC productions unless they plan to include that at a later stage.

During the year, they had licensed selected content to Netflix, Amazon Prime Video and VIU. Theoretically, it could be possible that they'll licence content to competitors as a means to keep SABC+ sustainable if not abandon the whole streaming regime.

It is very possible that the latter could resurface or get supplemented but that would probably be possible if SABC+ is able to see any growth consumer wise. Otherwise it's current state will look like a watershed version to the existing DStv Stream service.

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