The younger group has grown up with a screen in their hands so, using their smartphone and/or tablet to stay connected on social media and to their entertainment was natural.
Change was happening!
“The M&E industry has been going through growing pains over the past few years,” Allan McLennan, CEO of PADEM Media Group, said regarding the shift. “Broadband, both fixed and wireless, has become an integral part of our personal and professional connected lives while always on, always available content distribution has been testing the boundaries of local, regional and international business models.
“Then the pandemic hit, forcing a hiatus in production of new TV shows and movies around the globe,” McLennan continued. “So, studios/content owners with projects in post couldn’t afford to wait for people to return to the cinema. They began releasing the work to networks, broadcasters or OTT providers to maintain their product exposer and distribution supply chain as well as their cashflow while weighing the pros and cons regarding how future theatrical releases would play out.”
With the uncertainty of a vaccine, production and post are proceeding cautiously and differently from last year to refill the pipeline.
At the same time, the perfect storm – streaming content, people staying at home and acceptable economics – paved the way for a dramatic and what looks like a permanent change of the entire M&E ecosystem.
The industry is gaining a greater understanding and appreciation of how the Internet can perform when delivering content at scale to an ever-increasing audience.
Akamai and other CDNs have done an excellent job of managing the existing Internet capacity for fast, reliable delivery of games, video on demand and increasingly, sports and concert live streams.
But the Internet capacity and speed are not universal.
As Europeans sheltered in place, the