Netflix has reportedly lost nearly 1 million subscribers in the second quarter of 2022, largely because of growing competition from other streaming services, rising inflation, and a saturated US market.
This is the second consecutive quarter of subscriber losses for the streaming giant, following the loss of 200,000 paid subscribers in the first quarter – at the time the first quarterly subscriber decline for the company in more than a decade. Netflix estimates it will add 1 million net new subscribers in the current quarter.
The company says it will continue to prioritise overseas expansion, despite losing more than 750,000 subscribers in Europe, the Middle East and Africa and 1.3 million in the US and Canada. It did see subscriber growth in the Asia-Pacific region and in Latin America, where it gained 14,000 net new customers.
Despite the news, data from South African bank FNB shows a big jump in South Africans signing up for streaming services like Netflix, Amazon Prime, YouTube, and Spotify. Their spending on streaming has increased by a whopping 70% from the period before Covid-19 to June 2022, reports BusinessTech.
South Africa has become quite the darling of streaming services, as David Adeleke notes. That’s mainly because it has “the most advanced TV ratings system on the continent,” says TV critic Thinus Ferreira, and the fact that many South Africans have grown up with Hollywood movies and TV shows.
Netflix has also ramped up production of African-made content. It recently released “Country Queen” – its first series made in Kenya, shot in English, Swahili, and a mix of other local languages.
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