Potential Effects Of MultiChoice's Cable, Streaming And Diversified Portfolio Under Canal+

Below is what I speculate will become "New MultiChoice" with a bit of what's reported or shared by other media outlets so far.

Discarding non-core assets

In June 2024, Canal+ had been interviewed by journalists regarding the MultiChoice takeover which is being reviewed by the Competition Tribunal and ICASA. If the deal is approved, MultiChoice is expected to divest from non-core assets such as Namola, NMIS Insurance Services and Moment.

Canal+ had stated that it's strategy is not that of diversification but rather content distribution. Although the Competition Commission put up a three year clause over the retention of jobs it doesn't account to sale of assets.

It's also possible that under "New MultiChoice" some of these services such as SuperSportBET will be retained to compliment SuperSport's stellar lineup. Canal+ had stated they'd review the South African business which to me was their way of keeping an open mind.

Further restructuring to DStv's offering

MultiChoice has been seeing in drop in its consumer base for the DStv service with plans underway to fold it into an entity known as LicenceCo. Under this spin-off, MultiChoice's voting rights will be capped at 20% with economic interests amounting to 49%.

Even though the purposed structure is expected to satisfy regulators as it keeps the licence in South Africa, Canal+ has the influence over the budget and content strategies. Under "New MultiChoice", they could look to optimise profitability by reducing channels.

That could as well mean discarding niche and low performance channels such as Discovery Family, Nicktoons and Travel Channel. Although regulators placed a cap which preserves local entities like SABC News for 3 years but there's no telling what's going to happen after.

Repositioning of MultiChoice's streaming 

During the month, Warner Bros. Discovery decided to revert the streaming service Max back into HBO Max of course this was dealt with a lot of media debacle. Firstly, HBO Max removed a ton of content from its platform with the latter licensed to Netflix and Amazon Prime Video.

Warner Bros. Discovery is optimising for profitability and affected content on Max was generating little to no revenue for the company. This is where Showmax could end up as Canal+ is looking to position MultiChoice as "an entertainment leader in Africa".

This could imply reducing the amount of international content already seen on Showmax leading MultiChoice to prioritise Canal+'s francophone offering with Zacu Entertainment and Marodi TV.