Televisa and Univision will launch streaming platform in Spanish in the first semester

Mexican media giant Grupo Televisa and U.S.-based Univision are preparing to launch what would be the world’s largest Spanish-language streaming platform in the first half of 2022, after sealing a joint venture deal on Monday, an executive said.

The new company, TelevisaUnivision, will combine the content of both networks to target a global Spanish-speaking audience of 600 million people.

An ad-supported version of the streaming platform will launch in the first half of the year and the subscription-based product will launch in the second half, Alfonso de Angoitia, Televisa’s co-chief executive officer, said in an interview with Reuters.

The streaming platform, still without a name, enters a field full of strong competitors, such as Amazon’s Prime Video; Plus, from Disney, and Netflix, which last year announced that it would spend US$300 million on original Mexican productions.

De Angoitia, who will head TelevisaUnivision’s board, insisted that the platform could differentiate itself from the rest, highlighting Televisa’s huge content library and sports broadcast rights.

“We will be a fierce competitor,” he said, adding that at least one new “high-quality” movie or series would be uploaded to the subscription service every week in the first year.

Customers in Mexico and the United States will be the first to access the platform before it is rolled out in other Latin American countries and in Spain.

A kind of territorial war broke out after the TelevisaUnivision plan was made public in April.

Televisa attracted executives from Netflix, Disney Plus and others. Competitors scrambled to find big stars, prompting the Mexican company to establish more attractive and exclusive contracts with talent, De Angoitia said.

American singer and actress Selena Gómez, Peruvian writer Mario Vargas Llosa, Spanish author María Dueñas and Mexican comedian Eugenio Derbez are among those working on productions for the platform.

The new company will generate enough free cash flow to invest hundreds of millions of dollars in more content, De Angoitia said.

effective competition

The conclusion of the TelevisaUnivision agreement comes after a tumultuous week in the telecommunications industry in Mexico.

A long-awaited vote by the Federal Telecommunications Institute (IFT) left América Móvil, the largest company in the sector in the country, without the coveted authorization to enter the pay television market, a prospect that had shaken its competitors, including Televisa, the current leader in the segment.

“In the telecommunications sector we have not yet seen effective competition, it is not the time to grant that change to América Móvil,” De Angoitia said, adding that the IFT “could do more” to regulate competition.

America Movil’s foray into pay TV, already dominant in mobile phone and internet services, would make it “increasingly difficult to compete,” he added.

TelevisaUnivision’s operation is partially financed by a US$1 billion Series C preferred investment led by SoftBank Latin America Fund, with participation from ForgeLight, The Raine Group and Google, which also collaborated with technology and engineers.

Last week, Softbank announced the departure of its chief operating officer, Marcelo Claure, after a salary dispute. Claure will maintain her position on Univision’s board of directors, De Angoitia explained.