Pay-Per-View subscription model won’t work in Nigeria, MultiChoice, others tell Senate

MultiChoice Nigeria and major stakeholders in the pay television broadcasting industry in the country have rejected a pay-per-view model advocated by the Senate.

Major cable television providers in the country currently operate the monthly subscription model.

The stakeholders said that the Pay-Per-View model being canvassed by the Senate is not feasible.

MultiChoice and stakeholders in the sector made the assertions at a one-day public hearing organised by the Senate Ad-Hoc Committee investigating “Pay-Tv hikes and demand for the pay-per-view subscription model in Nigeria,” in Abuja.

The Committee was chaired by Deputy Senate Whip Senator Aliyu Abdullahi.

The Chief Executive Officer, MultiChoice Nigeria, Mr. John Ugbe, in his presentation, said several legal and legislative moves made to compel the firm to operate pay-per-view model did not work because it was not feasible.

He said, “Whilst it may appear to be a noble intent for this committee to be concerned over the rising cost of subscription services; however, the Pay-Per-View model being canvassed by this committee will not work either to the benefit of the consumer or the industry.

“It would appear that this problem is because of some confusion in understanding the basic definitions and distinctions between some of the existing operational business models in telecommunications and pay-tv broadcasting.

“A pay-per-view is not the same, and is very different from Pay-As-You-Go (PAYG).

“The Pay-Per-View model allows a subscriber to watch some special one-off events, usually of the high-ticket variety in sports and entertainment, by paying for such events in addition to having an active subscription.

“Pay-As-You-Go, accommodates a metered mode of service, where consumers are billed only for the service they consume and not for a fixed period.

“The desire by this Committee to adopt PPV is further challenged by the non-existence of any technology that can detect and or determine the viewers are tuned in per time.

“Once it is impossible to have this knowledge, billings based on ‘per view’ become difficult if not almost impossible.

“It is therefore my humble submission to this distinguished committee that due to the nature of content acquisition and technological limitations that PAYG model is not practical for broadcasting and thus is not practiced and basically cannot be implemented anywhere in the world.”

On the issue of incessant price increases by MultiChoice, Ugbe said several factors including inflation, programming content cost, broadcast transmission facilities and massive investment to innovate and keep up with technological changes were responsible for this.

Other factors, according to him, are anti-piracy costs, security costs, marketing and operational costs, exchange rate fluctuations, tax, regulatory fees, and cumulative national and local levies.