Update on Quibi TV

Last September 17, I put up a post entitled "The Allure of New TV." It talked about how Meg Whitman of ebay and Hewlett Packard fame and Jeff Katzenburg, an extremely prominent Disney alum, were teaming up to produce a new streaming device dubbed New TV at the time. The service would have short form video of extremely high quality with episodes lasting around 12 minutes apiece. The service would be available on wireless devices which translates largely to smartphones.

Recently, Ms. Whitman sat down with David Faber of CNBC for an interview. The link is:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rrFSs2vPp34

The service is slated to debut in 4th quarter of 2019 and has a formal name now--Quibi. The name is an abbreviation of Quick Bites. As usual, Mr. Faber gives a solid interview and Ms. Whitman is as direct as ever. One thing hit me and it may effect you the same way. The pricing structure for the service is $4.99 per month with advertising and $6.99 without commercial interruption. What is intriguing is $6.99 is the same price that Disney, one of Quibi backers, is charging for their new Disney + service.

I understand the concept and wish Quibi well. The target is people on the go, largely 18-35, who spend several hours on their mobile device daily and one hour of that watching video. Will they be willing to pay for it?

Informal polling that I have done shows a sharp, as you would expect, demographic divide regarding Quibi. Several 21 year olds told me that they loved the idea as Netflix episodes were too long. More mature people whom I would presume would be reaching for their reading glasses as I would, do not seem enamored with a service that they could only watch on their mobile device.

I see significant value on college campuses and people with long subway or mass transit commutes. Also, I suppose it might be a nice break during your lunch hour to catch an episode. Ms. Whitman admits that consolidation will hit the streaming space so maybe that is already baked in to the cake.

It will be very fun to watch how Quibi unfolds.

If you would like to contact Don Cole directly, you may reach him at doncolemedia@gmail.com