“In this life, there are only two ways out: to end up six feet under or to find a good place in politics.” Sitting in his wheelchair, the old godfather of the mafia of Lagos, Alaye Baba Adekunle, gives his lessons to his dolphin. The setting for the first original African film on Amazon Prime video, shot in fifty days in the Nigerian megalopolis, is set: Isale Eko district, clan war atmosphere and settling scores with axes. In Gangs of Lagos, by director Jade Osiberu, one law governs: “Eye for an eye, blood for blood”. Available since April 7 on the American platform, the thriller marks a new stage in the race towards Africa for the giants of video on demand.
“The continent represents a huge opportunity for these players faced with the saturation of the American and European markets, explains Sam Young, an analyst at the British research company Ampere Analysis. In the United States, 70% of households are already subscribers to at least one service, compared to 2% in Africa. Hence the interest of Netflix, Amazon, Disney + or Apple TV for these territories, where Internet penetration is growing rapidly.” The market, which today has 7 million subscribers across all platforms, could almost double by 2027 (by gaining an additional 6 million). Be the strongest growth in the world! It remains, to capture this clientele, to adapt to the context: inexpensive subscriptions, payable in “mobile money” or included in the telephone plan, the possibility of downloading programs to view them offline, and works rooted in local cultures.
Local content is king
In this battle for market share, Nigeria attracts all desires. The beating heart of the African film industry, “Nollywood” produces 2,500 films there a year. The production ecosystem already exists in this country of 216 million inhabitants (average age: 18), whose population will have doubled by 2050. A boon that did not escape the streaming pioneer, Netflix. The firm of Los Gatos (California) has made Nigeria one of its priority objectives. With success: the feature film Anikulapoan epic depicting the life of a man in the time of the ancient kingdom of Oyo (15th century) reached the top of the Top 10, excluding language films English.
“The more the story is local and authentic, the greater its chances of success, in its country as well as beyond its borders,” we note at Netflix. Among his biggest hits, South African fiction Silverton Headquarters (2022), which features three members of an anti-apartheid movement working for the release of Nelson Mandela, ranked No. 2 on Netflix’s Global Top the week of its release. Between 2016 and 2022, the platform invested $175 million in productions in South Africa, Nigeria and Kenya, its three target countries. Its American competitors are also getting involved and offering films and series in local languages (Yoruba, Wolof, Lingala). But these multinationals are not alone in this niche.
Showmax, African streaming pioneer
In Randburg, in the suburbs of Johannesburg, a company born in 2015 has taken a step ahead: “Showmax belongs to the South African pay-TV giant MultiChoice, which has 20 million subscribers and already has a huge African catalog , says analyst Sam Young. For example, in South Africa, it offers 5 times more African titles than Netflix.”
Attracted by this potential, the Canal + group invested in the capital of MultiChoice in 2020, of which it now holds 30%. “We have ambitious co-production projects combining their subscribers with the 7 million African subscribers of Canal +”, underlines David Mignot, general manager Africa of the French company, present for thirty years in nearly twenty French-speaking countries of the continent. The group has already produced twenty seasons of original series for Africa and intends to surf on the success of Showmax to increase its audiences tenfold. The South African platform already has broadcasting rights for certain Canal + content and broadcasts Multichoice/CANAL + co-productions such as the series Blood Psalms and Crime & Justice. Ambition? Export these made in Africa productions outside the continent. The appetite is there, internationally: 6 African films are presented this year at the Cannes Film Festival, including two in the running for the Palme d’Or. A first on the Croisette.