Viki, the streaming platform, is undeniably one of the major references in terms of Asian dramas. Karen Paek, the platform’s vice-president of marketing, shares her vision for the future of this service that shakes up the codes.
Viki, the streaming platform dedicated to Asian content founded in 2007 by students and bought by the Japanese giant Rakuten in 2013, anticipated the boom in Asian content. Supported from its beginnings by Japanese dramas and J-Pop clips, the platform with more than 75 million users worldwide, has expanded its catalog with Korean dramas, but also more niche markets like Boys. Love, Taiwanese series or… Chinese cartoons.
What a long way has come for this student project which aimed to help users learn foreign languages using subtitles (both in reading and in collaborative writing). 2010 was a first milestone, because the service became a company, but it was in 2013 with the acquisition by Rakuten that Viki took off both in Japan and internationally.
Karen Paek, Vice President of Marketing at Viki, tells Linternaute.com how the platform has embraced the explosion in popularity of K-dramas, and what its expectations are for the years to come.
Linternaute.com: K-dramas have exploded in recent years. Why you think ? How has this impacted the Viki platform?
Karen Paek (Viki’s VP of Marketing for Rakuten Viki): The demand for Asian content has grown in recent years, and has been accelerating for some time with the globalization of K-pop, K-dramas, and Asian films. At Viki, we see growing interest in this content every day. Our users want to watch Asian content to learn and appreciate different cultures, but also to enjoy the unique stories on offer.
In terms of cartoons, the most popular with fans are Japanese anime. However, your catalog has a lot of Chinese and Korean anime. Are they popular in France?
Viki recently launched a large catalog of Chinese anime in France. It is too early to evaluate their performance on our platform but we have already received positive reactions from fans who are delighted to have even more variety in content. We look forward to evaluating the category’s performance in France.
The community aspect is a major difference at Viki, both in terms of watch parties and in terms of community subtitling. Why was this particular choice made?
Our community of collaborators is the unique aspect of our streaming service. Users enjoy watching content, helping create captions, writing reviews, and participating in discussions with their fans on our streaming service. Our users have told us that with Viki, they have an important sense of belonging and feel connected to the community by watching content captioned by the community, selecting recommended content based on community reviews, or when they watch content together with our real-time commentary system or watch parties.
What population does this represent?
Our most popular series are subtitled by the community in more than 150 languages, including French. Subtitles break down language barriers by delivering content all around the world.
For watch parties, what content is most watched as a group?
The most unifying content is K-pop content and popular series from K-drama universes.
Another difference is your openness to Boys Love so-called BL content. HAS How popular is this genre around the world? And in France particularly?
We believe that Asian entertainment is for everyone and Viki intends to share diverse Asian genres with French audiences. We introduce Boys Love content almost every month, in order to have exciting and relevant content on our platform. Our French audience is always interested in a great mix of content, including BL, and we continue to invest in this type of entertainment to better serve their needs.
What are the 3 most popular genres in France?
In France, the three most popular genres on Viki are dramas, romantic comedies and romances. More than 50% of our French audience prefers these types of content.
In France, manga and anime are extremely popular. Does this have an impact on your licensing or production choices?
At Viki, we are always looking to add new genres of content to our library in order to best meet the expectations of our users. We started offering Chinese anime this year to expand our catalog and provide various options for our users.
What is the distribution in France between subscribed spectators and freemium (with advertising)?
In France, Viki’s SVOD (subscription video on demand) and AVOD (ad-supported video on demand) subscription users are distributed equally, and both subscriptions continue to grow.
Where do you see Viki in 5 years?
With the rise in popularity of Asian content, Viki will continue to invest in new and diverse content for our users around the world. The key to attracting new audiences is to have a wide diversity of content – free and paid – aimed at the whole family.