MNC Vision Pours 570 Billion Rupiah Funding to Migo, Planning for Collaboration

MNC Vision Networks (IDX: IPTV), a subsidiary of MNC Group which oversees several OTT business units, announced its investment in Migo Indonesia worth of $40 million or equivalent to 570 billion Rupiah. The funds will be used to increase service coverage with a target of 100 million users by 2022.

This funding continues Migo's acquisition in 2020 in the series B round. The amount is not stated, a series of venture capitalists and angel investors are involved, including Temasek, Provident Capital, Ray Zage (Commissioner of Gojek and Lippo Karawaci), Steve Chen (Co-founder & ex -CTO Youtube), and Pandu Sjahrir.

Compared to other streaming video services, Migo's technology is quite unique in the form of online to offline (O2O) videos-to-go which allows users to watch movies offline without buffering. Content distribution is done through Wargo (Warung Migo) or Migo Download Stations (MDS). Users only need to go to the partner grocery store location to download the content to be played offline on the application.

Content distribution mechanism on Migo app / Migo

In particular, Migo's target market is the mass market segment with data issues and without sufficient connectivity at home. Migo started its jouney in Indonesia since March 2020, before finally launching in the global market in June 2020 with a paid model. Currently, the service (the presence of partners) only covers area around Jakarta and Bekasi.

Furthermore, with the funds, Migo also targeting to provide MDS points in 10 thousand new locations in Java.

"Migo uniquely and exclusively innovates for 3 billion consumers in emerging markets. As the largest country in Southeast Asia, Indonesia is home to more than 200 million under-innovated people. These individuals and families basically want to fully participate in the digital age, and Migo can make that happen," Migo's Founder & CEO, Barrett Comiskey said.

Partnership with MNC

The IPTV corporate action will be followed by a series of strategic collaborations, continuing the integration of Vision+ in the Migo application which has been carried out since June 2021. The goal is to bring an OTT Vision+ viewing experience to offline customers. With the additional capital, Migo is quite optimistic about setting a target of 20 million monthly paid subscribers for the Vision+ service on Migo by 2025. Migo's subscription fee iranging from Rp15 thousand per month.

"Working with MNC Group, which provides enormous domestic resources and experience, to accelerate Migo's scale and increase the impact of Migo on society. MNC Vision Networks is an excellent partner while simultaneously expanding our network nationally in order to realize our mission We aim to change the digital life of Indonesians every day," Barrett added.

In addition, the agreement also includes the appointment of the President Director of MNC Vision Networks Ade Tjendra and the Marketing Head of the President Director of MNC Vision Networks Clarissa Tanoesoedibjo as the Board of Commissioners of Migo Indonesia.

"Supported by MVN's superior content and Migo's rapidly growing reach, we aim to reach tens of millions of people without access to OTT services, or are limited by data connection. In addition, we believe that this service is to change people's lives because they will have better access to entertainment and educational content," MNC Vision Networks' President Director, Ade Tjendra said.

MNC Group OTT Business

This year, MNC Vision Networks has announced several important plans. One that is quite significant is the plan to go public on the United States stock exchange for its subsidiary Asia Vision Networks (AVN) or known for its application product Vision+. The corporate action began with the signing of a merger agreement with a SPAC (Special Purpose Acquisition Company), Malacca Straits Acquisition Company (NASDAQ: MLAC), .

In addition to OTT (over the top) via video streaming applications, AVN also oversees MNC Play as a pay TV and broadband service operator.

MNC's strenght is evident in the content diversification provided. Moreover, they have television broadcast assets that dominate the national rating. The VOD application presented also bridges access to these shows, while providing post-show replay options. Migo's presence is certainly a good bridge to reach new people – especially to convert television viewers to VOD.

According to data presented in the disclosure early this year, Vision+ currently has 5.6 million subscribers, and 1.6 million of them are paid subscribers. Meanwhile, its competitors, according to Media Partners Asia data, until early this year Disney+ Hotstar already had 2.5 million paid subscribers in Indonesia, Viu had 1.5 million subscribers, and Vidio had 1.1 million subscribers. While Netflix has 800 thousand.

Meanwhile, according to their popularity (accessed today [14/9] via the analytics service AppBrain), the following is a list of the most popular VOD applications on the Android platform: