Mobilizedtv

mSpot Bets on Mobile Movies

Located  in Palo Alto, mSpot started its life offering streaming radio on cell phones in Spring 2005. The company also dabbled early on in offering full-length movies on mobile. According to mSpot CEO Daren Tsui, the company worked with Sprint to launch a long-form entertainment channel, with movies and episodic TV. The S-VOD (subscription video-on-demand) service took off, cementing Tsui’s belief that–despite what many in mobile say–people are happy to watch long-form programming on the mobile phone.

In October, mSpot launched a new VOD movie services, across all carriers and on 30 handsets. MobilizedTV spoke with Tsui about how the business of mobile movies is doing and what mSpot plans for the future (hint: think iPhone).

MobilizedTV: What did you learn about peoples’ behavior in watching movies on the mobile phone from your experiences with the Sprint channel?

Daren Tsui: The industry was saying all saying mobile was going to be short-form content and never take off as long-form media. We didn’t believe it. We thought it was a technology limitation. We started the Sprint channel as a subscription VOD service that retailed at $7/month. What we learned from that experience was that, on average, people watched 2.5 movies per month on our service. Typically people came in and out, in 15 to 20 minute sessions. Based on that, we saw the service grew steadily. The next part of it was how to get better content. Offering the service as S-VOD prevented us from getting blockbusters. The studios wanted us to create a VOD pay-per-view platform. Once we created that, they were able to license us all the new releases.

Where is mSpot in the movie release cycle?

It varies on a studio by studio basis, but we’re in the pay per view VOD window, right after DVD.  Some studios are more progressive and push the day and date concept;  then we can get them the same time as DVD.

Many people involved in mobile and content think that long-form content is not the future of mobile entertainment. What do you say to them?

I completely disagree that long-form isn’t working. Anecdotally, on flights going back and forth across the country, more and more folks are watching movies on iPhones and iPods versus the movie being shown on the plane. I’m a user as well. I’ve gotten caught up on my TV shows, like Lost, on my phone. I think we’ll prove the naysayers wrong.

What has been the attitude of the studios that are making mobile deals with you? Are they wary or enthusiastic?

I think the studios are eager to be on mobile. They want to learn about the medium. The people at Lionsgate, for example, are big on mobile. They’re looking at various opportunities on mobile, not just with us. They think it’s the wave of the future and another platform for licensing content. Most of the studios think that way. Some are more progressive than others. Some say, let’s experiment with a lot of different titles.  Some force windows or limit the content. One way or another, though, all the studios are experimenting and exploring mobile. The deals we strike, without going into specifics, is a standard VOD online deal.

Do you make money strictly on the rentals (which are between $4 and $6) or are you incorporating advertising or other revenue streams?

It’s all premium up-sells.

You originally had 300 movies. How many do you have now?

We’re closer to around 600 now. Our initial goal was to be at least over 1,000 by year’s end. We’re focusing on new releases and will back-fill the library titles later. Ingesting the content is automated and now that the system is ready, it’s starting to accelerate. At the rate we’re encoding the content, it’s getting quicker and quicker, so we’re on track to be at 1,000 titles by the end of 2009.

What’s the breakdown in terms of the kinds of phones people who access your movies are using?

It’s too early to have that information on the new service since we only launched a month ago. The best information from a reporting standpoint is from the older service on Sprint. From this, it appears that we get most use from the iPhone platform, among other smart phones.The earlier service on Sprint was focused on feature phones. On those types of services, the majority of our users are users with the larger displays. When Sprint came out with the Instinct with a display similar to that of the iPhone, all our sales grew very nicely with the Instinct.

How many people have joined the Movie Club, which enables users to get more movies for less and other premium information?

It’s very early on. We still haven’t done any marketing to it yet. We’re still trying to get all the movies encoded so there will be enough titles. I don’t think the Club service will grow until the beginning of next year.

What about quality of playback? Are you getting calls to customer service with problems?

We’ve fielded only a few tech support calls. We did just submit an iPhone app and they told us the video quality looks great. That’s good to hear, from Apple.

How are you looking to evolve your content offerings?

We are going to focus on content that is suited for the younger male, who is typically the early adopter of technology. We’ll also focus on children’s content, for parents wanting to pacify their kids while they’re out and about.

Are you open to licensing independent features? Should indie producers contact you?

Right now, we’re busy with all the studio agreements and digesting the titles from them. By mid of Q1 next year, we’ll catch a breather and then begin to look at indie content.

Tags: blockbusters on mobile, cell phones, Daren Tsui, iPhone app, iPhone platform, iPhones, iPods, Lionsgate, mobile entertainment, mobile long-form, mobile VOD movie service, movies on iPhone, movies on mobile, mSpot, mSpot Movie Club, smart phones, Sprint, Sprint Instinct

This entry was posted on Tuesday, November 17th, 2009 at 9:00 am and is filed under Content, Devices, Home Feature, Monetizing Mobile.