Disney focuses on local content for global expansion

ANAHEIM, California -- The Walt Disney Co. is concentrating on local content to attract more viewers worldwide for its streaming services through domestically produced stories that resonate with consumers in each market.

In Asia-Pacific, the global entertainment giant spent a “large” portion of its production budget on South Korea and Japan, although the content from the peninsula is more popular for global audiences, its executive said.

“We knew we needed to invest in local content to elevate Disney as an undisputed leader for bringing the best local talent and local stories to our DTC services,” said Rebecca Campbell, chairman of Disney’s international content and operations, referring to its streaming business.

“All of this fantastic content (produced from its US-based studios) is available globally but we know that some of it doesn’t resonate as well with our local audiences as it does here in the US, which is why we focus our content development on what we refer to as our ‘content whitespace,’” Campbell said during Disney’s global fan event D23 Expo last week.

The company has been expanding its presence in the global streaming industry with content produced by US studios including Disney, Marvel and Star Wars, as well as programs created by productions in other countries such as South Korean dramas and Japanese animation.

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Disney has been actively investing in content creation with spending for its fiscal year 2022 to end this month on content for the whole group up 32% to $33 billion on-year.

That helped the entertainment behemoth accelerate local content production.

“We have released 147 titles to date and by the end of the year we will have released 210 total titles across all four regions,” Campbell said, referring to Latin America, Europe, Middle East & Africa, India and the rest of the Asia-Pacific.

“It appears our strategy is working. We’ve been really pleased with their performance and how they’re resonating with our subscribers.”

The increase in content led to growth in subscribers. The total number of all of the company’s streaming services including Disney+ and ESPN+ stood at 221.1 million as of end-June, slightly higher than 220.7 million of Netflix Inc., the global streaming giant.

When asked about the company’s local content investment plan, Campbell said it will focus on creating “the best content for customers.”

“It’s not quantity, but it’s a quality game,” she said as the content creation budget is limited.

K-CONTENT

Campbell picked South Korean cultural products as local content that can resonate with global audiences.

“K-content is well adapted globally,” she said in a separate press briefing. “It also resonates in Asia. And we know that it resonates globally as well.”

She said BTS, the world’s top boy band, is the best music content for the global market. Disney+ has been showing “BTS: Permission to Dance On Stage – LA,” the seven-member group’s live performance in Los Angeles Sofi Stadium in November 2021, since Sept. 7.

Disney+ plans to release more than 20 Korean-language content including 12 originals such as a drama series Casino featuring Son Sukku, a star actor in Netflix's hit drama D.P., this year.

Carol Choi, Disney’s executive VP of original content strategy in Asia-Pacific, said South Korean content is more popular than that of Japan.

“I'll be quite honest compared with Japan you will see that Korean content is more widely accepted,” Choi said. “When we go back to the numbers game the proportion there will be more Korean live-action series compared to Japan.”

Write to Kiyeol Seo at philos@hankyung.com
Jongwoo Cheon edited this article.