It is now a decade since UK competition authorities prohibited Project Kangaroo, a proposed, Hulu-style video-on-demand service in which three UK broadcasters would offer their content through the same ad-supported platform.
So the intervening decade has seen individual broadcasters double-down on their own-brand viewing platforms.
In the case of Channel 4, the ad-funded public service network with a remit to be daring, that is All4. That platform is going great-guns, but, in this video interview with Beet.TV, Channel 4 head of agency and client sales Matthew Salmon says UK broadcasters are still collaborating where they can.
“All4, propietary VOD platform, is now 100% addressable across 27 different platforms and we’re now plugging into nearly 18 million registered users,” Salmon says.
“We’re collecting, gender, age, postcode – all the usual stats – which allows us to offer a fully addressable product to advertisers.”
Salmon says Channel 4 feels compelled to offer viewers programming wherever their screen may be, and to offer advertisers the ability to follow.
Whilst UK operators all use proprietary technology, “there’s lots of chat around collaboration”, he says.
Those methods of collaboration run the gamut, like pooling efforts in the UK’s joint broadcaster marketing association Thinkbox.
Although All4’s own-platform, on-demand offering has reached scale, and despite the UK’s Sky taking an early lead in addressable linear provision to consumers’ main TV, the latter remains a satellite-dependent play whose main users are from Sky’s own channel repertoire.
“Ultimately, addressable linear is challenging and there are lots of conversations that are taking place with different providers in the market,” Salmon says. “And what I would say is that we’re working in a much more collaborative way with ITV and Sky.”
This interview was conducted at the EGTA New York meetings hosted by Viacom. EGTA, the Brussels-based trade association of international television companies, is the sponsor of this Beet.TV series. For more videos, please visit this page.
