CEO: Paramount+’s International Content, Expansion Will Continue to Be Focus in Future

On Thursday, after reporting that Paramount+ grew its subscriber base to nearly 64 million customers, Paramount CEO Robert Bakish went into detail about the streaming service’s recent successes globally and reviewed its plans for the future.

Paramount+ is taking big steps in new regions, recently launching in U.K, Ireland, and South Korea, as bundles with other services. So far Bakish says Paramount is “off to a very good start” with these releases.

Bakish spoke about Paramount’s partnership with streaming services CANAL+ and Sky Cinema, which will see Paramount+ expand further in Western Europe.

“I’d make is this is a big year for Western Europe for us. We have Italy [launching] in September. That’s another launch with Sky on a hard bundled basis. That’s tracking very well,” said Bakish. “And then we have Germany and Austria and Switzerland with Sky in December, I believe, as well as France with
CANAL+”

Paramount announced a partnership with Vivendi-owned streaming platform CANAL+ earlier this year, one of France’s largest streaming platforms with over 8.9 million subscribers. Subscribers of Canal +’s Cine Séries package will have access to Paramount+ at no additional cost. Paramount also teamed up with British owned streaming platform Sky Cinema, which gives subscribers free membership to Paramount+ as well. Paramount+ saw its official release In South Korea as a free addition to online streaming service TVING, back in June.

After launching in the U.K. and Ireland in June, Bakish also discussed the importance of local content for the company, highlighting the company’s partnership with Channel 5, the U.K’s third largest commercial tv station, as a key driver for original content.

The streamer has plans to add 150 original international films and series over the next few years.

Bakish also spoke on some of Paramount’s plans for India, which may be launching in collaboration with Viacom in 2023.

“It’s going to be part of a streaming offering for the Indian market, that Viacom18 is going to launch in 2023,” said Bakish. “We’ve also said that we are going to — Paramount+ is going to launch with it, essentially as another form of hard bundle, a tier.”

Bakish attributes much of Paramount’s growth to these partnerships with well-established cable and streaming brands.

“To your question of is this Q2 only boost to subs? Or does it extend past that? It definitely extends past that… hard bundle, plus channel stores like Roku and Amazon and Apple… we’ll be deploying all of that in those markets,” said Bakish.

Considering Paramount+’s continued growth, especially internationally, it appears that the company’s global business plan has put the streamer on a path to success for years to come.