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Viaplay Loses 1 Million Users, Announces Plans to Sunset Platform in US and UK

Viaplay Loses 1 Million Users, Announces Plans to Sunset Platform in US and UK

David Satin
David covers the biggest news stories, live events, premieres, and informational pieces for The Streamable. Before joining TS, he wrote extensively for Screen Rant and has years of experience writing about the entertainment and streaming industries. He's a Broncos fan, streams on his Toshiba Fire TV, and his favorites include "Andor," "Rings of Power," and "Star Trek: Strange New Worlds."
Read full bio ›
David Satin

American customers will have to say goodbye to Viaplay. The Nordic streaming service reported its second-quarter earnings on Thursday morning and revealed that it had shrunk to 6.6 million subscribers. That’s a decrease of around 1 million over the 7.64 million global customers the service claimed at the end of Q1 in April.

The real story to come from Viaplay’s earnings report was the announcement that it was pulling its streaming platform out of the United States and United Kingdom. Henceforward, Viaplay will focus on the Nordic and Dutch markets, while offering certain content internationally through third parties with Viaplay Select. The company will also lay off around 25% of its employee base in an attempt to get on the right financial footing.

“We are today announcing a new strategy and plan, which includes, but is not limited to, focusing on our core Nordic, Netherlands and Viaplay Select operations,” said CEO Jørgen Madsen Lindemann. “[We are] implementing a new operational model; downsizing, partnering or exiting our other international markets; rightsizing and pricing our product offering in the Nordics and undertaking a major cost reduction programme.”

Executive shakeups were a big story at Viaplay during the last quarter, which was one reason many in the industry were expecting Viaplay’s earnings report to be soft this month. After having to downgrade its financial expectations for the rest of this year, the company said goodbye to CEO Anders Jensen, who resigned in early June. External pressures, combined with internal cost-cutting measures that did not fulfill expectations led to the downgrade, and now to even more drastic measures such as the cutting of the U.S. and U.K. markets.

Last month, all indications from Viaplay were that the company still thought of its American customer base as integral to its future. Executives told The Streamable they wanted to hit a target of 4 million international customers by the end of this year. However, the company’s chief commercial officer for North America Vanda Rapti said that its spend on U.S. operations was “minimal,” and that the company was most efficiently monetizing its European customers, which partially explains why the company leapt to the decision to simply shutter the service on this side of the Atlantic.

There was no confirmed date on when U.S. customers could expect Viaplay to be shut down. Users who enjoyed watching international content on Viaplay should look into services like Acorn TV and Britbox, which specialize in British TV series and movies.

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Viaplay

Viaplay is a video on demand service focused on Nordic storytelling with more than 1,500 hours of award-winning content. The content library includes “Trom,” “Furia,” and “Partisan.” The line-up also includes Viaplay’s provocative young adult drama “Threesome,” a broad range of compelling documentaries, and much more.

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David Satin
David covers the biggest news stories, live events, premieres, and informational pieces for The Streamable. Before joining TS, he wrote extensively for Screen Rant and has years of experience writing about the entertainment and streaming industries. He's a Broncos fan, streams on his Toshiba Fire TV, and his favorites include "Andor," "Rings of Power," and "Star Trek: Strange New Worlds."
Read full bio ›
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