Operated by TelevisaUnivision, ViX was launched in the USA, Mexico and Speaking-Spanish Latin America on March 31, targeting 600 million Spanish-speakers. The two-level service offers an AVOD (ViX) and SVOD (ViX+) option in the same app, including +50,000 hours of Spanish-language content, sports and news programming on its first year.
TelevisaUnivision Inc., the world’s leading Spanish-language media and content company, unveiled ViX that offers +50,000 hours of Spanish-language content across genres, including originals and movies, live sports, live news and current Televisa and Univision hits as well as access to an extensive library of top franchise content and formats from Televisa’s vault.
The two-tier service includes a free AVOD product, ViX, with 100 EPG channels and +40,000 hours of VOD content (MGM, Disney and Televisa), and an SVOD option, ViX+, with premium content, including “ViX+ Originals” and exclusive soccer, set to launch in the second half of 2022. The existing OTT options, PrendeTV, Blim TV and AVOD VIX (acquired in 2021) are being incorporated seamlessly into the new platform in the coming months.
Wade Davis, CEO: ‘With the content and capabilities of TelevisaUnivision, we are capable of delivering a groundbreaking streaming service to the nearly 600 million Spanish speakers around the world. Beyond our audience, ViX expands our solutions to both our ad and distribution partners, creating powerful ways for them to reach our audience and grow our businesses together. There is nothing like this in the marketplace’.
Pierluigi Gazzolo, President and Chief Transformation Officer: ‘With the merger of Televisa and Univision, we have an incredible experience in reaching Spanish speaking audiences, accessing Televisa’s 300,000 hours of content, prolific production engine and an extensive portfolio of IP, and will make significant incremental investments in content beyond our networks. Combined with the massive reach we have with our audience, this content will fuel our streaming service like no other in Spanish language’.
Prensario interviewed the leaders of each segment. Rafael Urbina, GM & EVP, ViX: ‘We have implemented an aggressive content and acquisitions strategy, combining our library with third-party content that we will permanently renew. The non-linear world limits us much less when it comes to purchasing, because we need a little of everything. We are agnostic in genres, although we know that melodrama is among the most demanded’.
The AVOD bets on originals content, including its own channels such us Univision Noticias (news) and Zona TUDN (sports), and also on productions such as Jorge Ramos‘ talk show. ‘We are going to progressively expand the number of channels and content, covering all targets and understanding the demand of the audience. Our combined channel + content offering will be very robust’, he concluded.
Rodrigo Mazón, GM & EVP, ViX+ referred to the balance between the library content (+300,000 hours) with the one available at ViX+. ‘We are fortunate to have a huge and highly valued catalog of audiovisual icons that gives us the ideal kick to start. We are exploring the “vault” and regulating the releases, while we put in place the aggressive commitment to original production’.
Under a powerful investment plan of billions of dollars, ViX + will offer +50 originals in 2022 or almost one new per week. Under the label “Novelas ViX+”, it highlights Televisa Studios‘ reboot of Senda Prohibida (the very first telenovela from 1958), Mas alla de Ti from Rosy Ocampo or W Studios‘ La mujer del Diablo.
Notable among the series are Mario Varga Llosa’s Travesuras de la Niña Mala; the 360 Powwow and Isla Audiovisual Los Artistas, based on María Dueñas; projects with Eugenio Derbez (3 Pas) and the most renowned directors from Mexico like Guillermo del Toro and Alfonso Cuarón; co-productions with Dynamo, Nautilus, with The Mediapro Studio, Las Pelotaris, with El Estudio, Marea Alta or biopics about María Félix and Pedro Infante.
On movies, ViX+ has an exclusive premiere agreement with Videocine, who has the 70% of the Mexican box office, with Enfermo Amor (Carla Sodi), Presencias (Yalitza Aparicio), Pinches Momias de Santiago Limon and executive production from Ben Silverman (Propagate and Perro Azul) and the first feature film of the “First Look Deal” with Salma Haiek‘s Ventanarosa Producciones: Quiero Tu Vida.
Also, exclusive originals such as the biopic Jenni, from Mucho Mas Media, a movie based on the life of the late Mexican American idol Jenni Rivera, produced by Hollywood creators Javier Chapa and Donald De Line; and Selena Gomez’s Mi Vecino El Cartel, a true-crime documentary series from July Moon Productions and Blackfin.
Sports will be a key driver for both VIX and VIX+. More than 3,000 games per year, including the local Liga MX and the leagues in Argentina and Brazil, the rights to Qatar 2022 and original content such as Al Grito de Guerra about the Mexican National Team. ‘We are going to have the largest sports offer in Spanish on the market’, agreed Urbina and Mazón.
And they concluded: ‘Although they will be two different experiences, they will be closely related and users will be able to go from one to the other within the app. We believe that this is the great innovation of TelevisaUnivision both in terms of technology and content’.
