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A30 PEOPLE & ARTS
Saturday 11 January 2020
Hollywood-backed Quibi thinks

you'll pay for its video bites

LAS VEGAS (AP) — A start- service like Quibi can at- sold out its $150 million first-
up heavily backed by Hol- tract mobile viewers — year advertising slots to
lywood is wagering that particularly younger ones blue-chip companies in-
you're ready to set aside — already immersed in an cluding Procter & Gamble,
YouTube and TikTok to ocean of free-to-watch Anheuser Busch, General
watch star-studded short short video on YouTube Mills, Google, T-Mobile and
videos on your phone — for and other social-media Walmart. Ads will appear
a price. services. It will also go up before shows and aren't
The company behind this against roughly a half-doz- skippable.
People take pictures of a display of LG Signature OLED R TVs at billion-dollar bet is Quibi en other paid streaming Jeff Wlodarczak, principal
the LG booth during the CES tech show, Tuesday, Jan. 7, 2020, (KWIH-bee), which is pre- platforms from Netflix, Am- analyst at Pivotal Research
in Las Vegas.
Associated Press paring to offer movies, azon Prime Video and Hulu Group, says he understands
shows and other short form to Disney Plus and upcom- why advertisers are flock-
video designed for view- ing services from Warner- ing to the product. Millenni-
ing in short bursts on mobile Media and NBCUniversal. als can be hard to reach,
devices. It's an enormous During the keynote Quibi he said, and when a brand
gamble, especially con- previewed shows includ- places ads on YouTube or
sidering that several earlier ing "Don't Look Deeper," Snapchat, they never quite
efforts in mobile entertain- a sci-fi show starring Don know what kind of video
ment — most notably Veri- Cheadle and Emily Mortim- they might end up next to.
zon's ill-fated Go90 service er, and "#Freerayshawn" a Quibi offers a safe place
— fell flat. crime thriller starring Lau- for advertisers by deliver-
Founded by former Disney rence Fishburne as a cop ing a known quantity "as
studios chief and Dream- and executive produced opposed to people doing
Works co-founder Jeffrey by "Training Day" director something stupid on You-
Katzenberg and helmed Antoine Fuqua. Shows and Tube," he said.
by former Hewlett Pack- movies, as well as other That advertising model
ard Enterprise CEO Meg material like news and will stick around, Whitman
Whitman, Quibi is heavy on weather, are designed to said. Quibi guarantees
big ideas and Hollywood be watched in "quick bites" that all creators own their
muscle. It has backing from of 10 minutes or less."'Paid own intellectual property,
all the major movie studios premium short form' (video) and can repackage it and
and entertainment com- has never been in the same take it wherever else they
panies, $1 billion invested sentence. It has never real- want after seven years. It
in original programming ly been proven," said Seth brought creators in, but
and star power in the form Shapiro, managing partner it also means that Quibi
of creators and producers at Pacific Strategy Part- needs both subscriber dol-
from Steven Spielberg to ners. "That's the challenge." lars and advertising reve-
Chrissy Teigen. Among other things, he nue to stay afloat.
Quibi plans to launch on noted, it's already possible The company just closed
April 6. It will charge $5 a for people to watch those on another $400 million eq-
month for an ad-supported other services in the same uity funding round from in-
service, and $8 a month for quick bites Quibi plans. vestors, Whitman said, and
an ad-free version. Quibi executives at the CES has a plan to be profitable
Company executives ar- gadget show in Las Vegas "soon."
gued at CES that Quibi will showed off technology on Others ha ve tried short
offer the first entertainment Wednesday designed to for m content, mostly in
platform designed exclu- make video viewing on the ad-supported form. Face-
sively for the phone. In an phone easier. For instance, book Watch features origi-
interview at CES, Katzen- it will let you watch full- nal shows with episodes as
berg said it represents the screen video whether you short as 12 or 13 minutes, but
first time "professional sto- hold the phone upright or none have garnered much
rytellers" have tackled the sideways. buzz or mainstream atten-
problem of delivering a Filmmakers deliver two ed- tion so far. Verizon pulled
high-quality viewing experi- its to the company, one the plug on Go90 in 2018,
ence on mobile. vertical, one horizontal, roughly three years after it
But the big question is and Quibi stiches them launched; several concur-
whether a subscription together with one audio rent efforts have also shut
track. Some creators have down. Meanwhile, Netflix,
incorporated that feature Amazon and Hulu have all
into their productions, as in been experimenting with
one show in which horizon- short-form offerings, many
tal viewing delivers a tradi- of them in comedy .
tional picture — but turning Quibi is "either brilliant or
the phone upright displays tone deaf," said Tim Han-
a view from the main char- lon, CEO of Vertere Group.
acter's phone camera. "I just don't know what the
Advertisers, at least, are answer is and I don't think
on board. Quibi said it has anybody does."q