OYSTER BAY, N.Y.—Much like the rest of the world, 8K TVs are not having the 2020 they expected. Manufacturers of TV panels capable of displaying the high-resolution had hoped for a strong showing of sales, but as ABI Research reports, those numbers were impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic.

ABI’s latest report reveals that the overall flat-panel TV market is sluggish in 2020 because of economic uncertainties. There was expectation that 8K-capable TVs would help boost the market, but the one-year delay of the 2020 Olympics, which was going to consist of 8K content, is among the key factors that have led to low 8K TV unit shipments for 2020.

Flat-panel TV makers are still pushing 8K TV sets, though. Samsung and LG are reportedly aiming to increase 8K TV sales to generate higher revenues and profit margins. Samsung has offered promotional prices for its 8K TV sets as a way to counteract many consumers’ economic challenges from the pandemic, ABI says.

“Although 8K TV set price points have declined from a year ago, the cost of most 8K TV sets is still relatively high, ranging from $3,500 to $30,000,” said Khin Sandi Lynn, industry analyst at ABI. “High cost and lack of content will delay 8K TV set adoptions.”

ABI estimates that just 1% of worldwide flat-panel TV shipments in 2021 will be 8K TV sets.

For more information, visit ABI’s website. 

OYSTER BAY, N.Y.—The cord-cutting trend has only picked up steam because of the COVID-19 pandemic, and not just in mature markets where the practice was already making a significant impact.

ABI Research has reported that cord-cutting is starting to take hold in emerging markets, like India, in addition to markets like the U.S., where broadband penetration is high. According to ABI, Indian satellite TV operator Tata Sky lost 1.5 million subscribers in the first half of 2020. In addition, as much as 80% of subscription fees could not be collected by Indian cable operators because of consumers struggling to pay their bills. Similar trends are occurring in other emerging markets like Brazil, Colombia and Thailand, per ABI.

“In mature markets, cord-cutting could create an opportunity for streaming services since some cord-cutters may choose video streaming to replace pay-TV service,” said Khin Sandi Lynn, industry analyst at ABI. “However, in emerging markets, low broadband penetration could be a barrier for many consumers to move to streaming.”

PLUS: OTT Reaches Tipping Point, Per CTA

Because of this, ABI says that pay-TV service providers need to implement price adjustments, like repackaging services into smaller channel bundles or increase promotions. Heavier subsidizing of Consumer Premise Equipment may also help ease fees for customers during this time. However, content security measure must also be put in place, ABI recommends, as a sudden spike in churn could result in content piracy.

One of the key reasons for the loss of pay-TV customers during the pandemic has been the loss of live sports programming. ABI believes that the return of sports will make the deep subscriber loss temporary, especially in the markets with limited broadband connectivity. ABI projects that in 2025 there will be 1.1 billion pay-TV subscribers globally; there is currently 1.07 billion, according to ABI.

For more information, visit www.abiresearch.com.  

OYSTER BAY, N.Y.—While Disney+ has already proved immensely popular among consumers, its continued success, and the emergence of other subscription-based services, are key behind ABI Research’s projection that by 2024 the OTT video market will be more than $200 billion.

According to a new report from ABI, 90% of that $200 billion in OTT video revenue will come from SVOD and advertising. Already ABI has seen subscriptions in the Asia-Pacific region growing significantly, primarily in China and India.

However, pay-TV is not being shut out of this growth. ABI says that the pay-TV industry has been embracing OTT as an added value rather than competition, and that over time traditional pay-TV may “become indistinguishable from a pure OTT package of services,” said Michael Inouye, principal analyst at ABI Research.

In 2019, there were more than 700 million OTT SVOD subscriptions globally, while there were more than 1 billion subscriptions for pay-TV. ABI notes that pay-TV growth is slowing (even declining in North America), but it believes that the overall market is expanding.

“Increasingly, we’re seeing more solutions and conversations about bringing content and services together,” said Inouye. “This includes pay-TV and OTT bundles and extends to cross-platform advertising, analytics and customer/service management. Ultimately it makes the market more accessible to a wider range of companies and expands the potential video touchpoints, particularly as new technologies like 5G, smart home and augmented/virtual reality play larger roles.

ABI’s full report, “OTT and Multiscreen Video and Digital Content,” is available on its website.

OYSTER BAY, N.Y.—The impact of Disney+ goes beyond all the memes of Baby Yoda from “The Mandalorian.” The direct-to-consumer (DTC) OTT service, which will be joined by others like HBOMax and NBCUniversal’s Peacock in 2020, is forecasting a shift in the video market, according to a new report from ABI Research.

ABI dove into this and other topics in its “54 Technology Trends to watch in 2020” report. Some of the other trends dealt with virtual reality and augmented reality, 8K and 5G.

The last few years, virtual MVPDs like YouTube TV, DirecTV Now (now AT&T TV Now) and PlayStation Vue (soon to be defunct) were seemingly pointing to how content was distributed as being the key factor in a changing market. However, the popularity of Disney+ and its library of content is shifting that paradigm, and the launch of DTC services HBOMax and Peacock—with deep libraries of content of their own—will result in consumers debating how they will spend their content budget, per ABI.

This will make it difficult for new services that do not have preexisting content to make an impact in the market, predicts ABI. It says Apple TV+ is an example of that already with its lower price ($5 per month) and its bundling with new Apple hardware purchases to help spur subscriber growth.

ABI does see a potential avenue for traditional pay-TV operators. “[T]he shift to DTC does create an opportunity for these MVPDs to serve as an aggregation point for fragmented OTT services,” ABI writes.

2020 may be a good year for DTC, but ABI does not see a big growth in 8K TVs. While the 2020 Summer Olympics in Japan will be broadcasting in 8K, that hi-res broadcast is expected to be limited to the host country. In reality, 8K content for TVs around the world is still extremely limited, so, “without the content to take advantage of the higher resolution, adoption, of course, will be limited,” ABI reasons. 

Price is expected to come down for 8K TVs, though it is still expected to be higher than the average consumer can afford, so ABI forecasts less than 1 million shipments of 8K TVs worldwide in 2020. However, 4K TVs are expected to see some growth.

Other findings from ABI’s report touched on VR and AR technology. While there is growing buzz for consumer VR experiences, it is not expected to see a big growth as there still needs to be some maturation in both the hardware and software for the technology. AR, on the other hand, is expected to have some significant growth, particularly on mobile platforms. 2020 will be more of a chance for VR to establish a clearer path moving forward, says ABI.

ABI also touched on the deployment of 5G. It said that it expects 5G Fixed Wireless Access services to see “accelerated growth,” while other 5G services will continue to be built out, though there will still be ample room for growth in the coming years.

One thing that ABI did not touch on that is set for a major deployment next year is Next Gen TV. The new television standard garnered no mention in the report, even though it is expected be available in the top 40 U.S. markets by the end of 2020.

More information can be found on ABI Research’s website, www.abiresearch.com.

OYSTER BAY, N.Y.—The spinning wheel when a video is buffering or hearing neighbors cheer a big play while viewers try to live stream sports is one of the top concerns for the growing streaming market, making low latency solutions a need, according to ABI Research.

A new study from ABI forecasts that by 2024 there will be 91 million subscribers that utilize live video streaming. Latency issues have the ability to negatively impact a viewer’s experience streaming content.

ABI states that typical latency for HTTP streaming is 40 seconds, while broadcast latency is about 5 seconds. Especially in sports, that time difference can have a major impact.

“Many cord-cutters are still willing to get live streaming for sports programs. However, high delay compared to traditional broadcast sources can prevent many consumers from accessing live streaming,” said Khin Sandi Lynn, industry analyst at ABI.

Latency issues do not just impact the time-delay in watching sports, but also issues of buffering for other video content. ABI references multiple studies that show viewers stop watching live streams as they experience buffering issues. So, as a number of new streaming services enter the market, they are finding it important to support low latency streaming.

Other areas consumers don’t want to experience latency issues include eSports streaming, online betting and online auctions.

ABI notes that there are many different ways to support low latency, like encoding, CDN optimization or video playback optimization, but businesses must select the best fit for them.

“When the evaluation between video qualities, deployment cost and business cases are done properly for low latency streaming solution deployment, service providers can offer a high-quality streaming service and improve churn and revenue,” said Lynn.

More information is available in ABI’s full “Low and Ultra-Low Latency Video” report.

OYSTER BAY, N.Y.—Perhaps the death of traditional pay-TV has been exaggerated. That is one possible take away from a new report from ABI Research that finds despite the growth of video streaming platforms, the worldwide pay-TV market is expected to see a rise in subscribers by 2024 that would surpass 1.1 billion.

ABI’s report does not argue the fact that streaming is impacting the pay-TV market, particularly in North America, where cable, satellite and IPTV services in the region lost 1.2 million subscribers in the first quarter of 2019. A big reason for the rise in popularity of streaming services is the availability of high-speed broadband and a multitude of streaming services, according to ABI.

However, the popularity of streaming services varies from region to region depending on price points, content choices and stability of video delivery across different platforms, and in many emerging markets traditional pay-TV services remain the top choice.

Another way that pay-TV providers are looking to compete with streaming services is by offering their own live streaming services for lower costs compared to traditional TV packages. Other attempts include the deployment of Android TV set top boxes to integrate streaming and pay-TV services. The use of these kind of set top boxes are becoming popular in emerging markets as well.

In addition, analytics is a contributing factor to pay-TV services ability to keep and grow its customer base. “Analytics solutions based on artificial intelligence and machine learning algorithms can provide comprehensive insights on content consumption, prediction of churn, etc., which is valuable for content recommendation, improving user interface and proposing best-fit packages to customers to prevent or reduce subscriber loss,” said Khin Sandi Lynn, an ABI industry analyst.

This information is from ABI’s Pay-TV Subscribers market data report. For more information on the data, visit ABI’s website.

OYSTER BAY, N.Y.—Despite the dearth of high-res content, 4K TV will grow to become the mainstream TV format over the next few years, with worldwide sales reaching 233 million, a CAGR increase of 13%, according to ABI Research. The research firm also predicts that market acceptance for 8K TV will mirror that of 4K in which declining prices of TV models will spur consumer acceptance.

Samsung, LG, Sony and TCL have all launched 8K TV sets, which, depending on the display size, are currently priced between $5,000 - $70,000.

“The cost of 8K TV sets is far from affordable for most consumers,” said Khin Sandi Lynn, industry analyst at ABI Research. “This will limit the sales volume for the foreseeable future, however, we can expect the price points to decline to a more reasonable level over the next several years, just as 4K sets have.”

Content for 8K sets is far scarcer than for 4K, ABI notes, with only Japanese broadcaster NHK currently providing 8K content via its “Super Hi-Vision” format. Korean Broadcast Corp. (KBS) and European streaming provider Rakuten have both announced tentative plans to offer 8K content sometime in 2019. 8K also requires much larger files and bandwidth and ABI thinks that the next generation VVC format (versatile video coding)—which offers 34% higher efficiency over HEVC—will “play a vital role” when standardization is completed in 2020.

OYSTER BAY, N.Y.—Shipments of 4K TVs worldwide this year will exceed 102 million units, representing more than four in 10 flat panel TVs shipped, according to a new forecast from market research firm ABI Research.

By way of comparison, 4K TVs accounted for a third of units shipped in 2017, it said.

“As expected, 4K is quickly becoming the standard for TV sales,” said ABI Research industry analyst Khin Sandi Lynn.

The forecast is part of ABI Research’s new “Media Devices: UltraHD, 4K, HDR, 8K, HEVC” report.

According to the report, flat panel TVs are now found in 85 percent of households worldwide, which has slowed growth in the category. However, the transition from HD to 4K Ultra HDTV is expected to spur heightened growth, especially as 4K content becomes more widely available to viewers.

[Read: Bigger Is Still Better (At Least In The Living Room)]

“Just like HD before it, hardware technology reached the market far before any content did, placing an impetus on content creators and providers to catch up, while also allowing for a time of transition,” said Lynn.

Netflix and Amazon Prime are streaming 4K content, and pay TV providers, such as Russia’s Tricolor TV, are launching 4K movie channels. In the United States, Verizon and Frontier Communications are testing 4K services.

“Better visual experience and availability of 4K content together with declining price points are driving 4K TV set shipments,” said Lynn.

By region, Asia-Pacific will represent 37 percent of global 4K TV shipments this year. The Chinese market, where several low-cost 4K models are sold, is the main driver in the region.

When combined, the North American and European regions will account for nearly half of all 4K TV shipments in 2018, the research organization predicted.

The compounded annual growth rate for 4K flat panel TVs will achieve 17.3 percent, reaching 194 million unit shipments in 2022, it said.

As 4K TV becomes the norm, questions about HDR and its numerous flavors will become the focus, Lynn added.

More information about the new report is available on the ABI Research website.

OYSTER BAY, N.Y.—Traditional pay-TV providers are feeling the heat from OTT subscription services as hundreds of millions worldwide choose over-the-top providers for their video content, according to a new report from ABI Research.

The report, “Service Provider OTT Services and Set-top boxes Update,” finds the OTT subscriber base will reach 400 million this year, largely by providing a lower-cost service with no long-term contracts.

In North America and Europe, pay-TV operators fighting fire with fire. There, operators are offering their own OTT services, improving churn by offering consumers less costly alternatives.

[Read: Study: US OTT Revenue Climbed 41 Percent In 2017]

DirecTV’s Now, Dish Network’s Sling TV and Sky’s Now TV are among the operators offering Virtual Multichannel Video Programming Distributor (vMVPD) services, linear channels via an internet connection. “vMVPD services offer live TV packages as low as US$10 and customized packages are attracting cost-sensitive customers,” says Khin Sandi Lynn, industry analyst at ABI Research.

Dish Network’s Sling, which has secured 2 million customers since launching two years ago, and DirecTV Now, which has won 1.2 million subscribers in one year, are examples of successful vMVPDs. DirecTV has even been able to offset satellite subscriber losses with its vMVPD service, the research firm says.

Although vMVPD packages cost less, live sports packages and customized feature sets have elevated average revenue per user when compared to other OTT subscription services. Both Hulu and YouTube launched live services last year.

“As competition intensifies, content and quality of service are crucial to win the OTT war,” says Lynn.

More information is available on the ABI Research website.