- In the first 9 months of 2019, Netflix has reached $1 billion in revenue from the Asia Pacific region, reporting a 57 percent increase from 2018.
In the first nine months of 2019, Netflix has reached $1 billion in revenue from the Asia Pacific region, reporting a 57 percent increase from $669 million in the same timeframe last year.
The streaming giant that for the first time broke down its international business’ sales and subscriber base said it had 14.48 million subscribers in the Asia Pacific region as of September 30, 2019, up from 9.46 million subscribers in the same period last year and almost tripled from 5.8 million subscribers in the corresponding period in 2017.
Except for India, the Asia Pacific region covers Japan, New Zealand, Australia, South Korea, Indonesia, Thailand, Philippines, Malaysia, Singapore, Vietnam, and Singapore.
Although Asia remains a small portion of Netflix’s overall business, the data show has posted the highest revenue and subscriber base growth across all regions over the past three years.
Europe, the Middle East, and Africa (EMEA) market is now Netflix’s largest non-U.S. region, with a subscriber base of 47.4 million and revenues of almost $4 billion as of September 30, 2019, compared to 33.8 million subscribers and revenues of $2.87 billion over the same span.
Netflix’s subscriber base in Latin America has risen from 24.1 million subscribers in the corresponding period last year to 29.4 million as of September 30, 2019. Revenue also rose from $1.67 billion in the corresponding period last year to $2 billion for the first nine months in 2019.
That said, what might be a concern for the California-based Los Gatos company is the lower revenue per user in international markets, especially in price-sensitive markets such as India.
In the Asia Pacific region, Netflix generated an average of $9.31 per subscriber, compared with $10.26 in the EMEA region and $12.36 in the United States for the nine months ended September 30, 2019.
As the streaming service seeks to expand its access to new cheaper plans in emerging markets, this could potentially dip further.
In July this year, Netflix unveiled a mobile-only service in India and is currently testing the country’s discounted long-term subscription plans, ET announced on December 11. It is also carrying out mobile-only services in other Asian markets such as Malaysia and exploring different pricing structures to expand its subscriber base, said Greg Peters, chief product manager of Netflix in October this year.
ET reported last month that the Indian subsidiary of Netflix saw a 700 percent increase in its FY19 sales to Rs 466.7 crore for the financial year with a net profit of Rs 5.1 crore.
However, since the company does not share the cost or amortization ratio of region-wise content, it is difficult to determine operating profitability on the market.
The Indian arm of American streaming service Netflix expanded more than 700 percent during 2018-19, posting Rs. 466.7 crore sales for FY19 with a net profit of Rs. 5.1 crore, according to its filing with the company registrar. The video-on-demand company owned by Reed Hastings had a turnover of Rs. 58 crore in FY18 with Rs. 20 lakh net profit.
Netflix is competing in India with, among others, Disney-owned Hotstar, Amazon Prime Video, ZEE5, Times Internet -owned MX Player, ALTBalaji, Sony LIV, and Viacom18 Voot.
