After successfully launching two streaming services in two years, Foxtel Group’s streaming division now has a third service live.
The news aggregator Flash is now up and running. Here are the details:
Foxtel’s Flash mob
Monthly cost: $8
How: Download the app or visit https://www.flashnews.com.au/.
When can you join: Now
Can I test it? 14-day free trial.
How many news feeds are there? 25+
What are the news sources at launch: Al Jazeera, ausbiz, BBC World News, Bloomberg TV, Bloomberg Quicktake, Channel News Asia, CNBC, CNN International, ET Now, FOX News Channel, FOX SPORTS News, GB News, i24NEWS, France24, news.com.au, NHK World, REA, Russia Today, Sky News Australia, Sky News UK, Sky News Extra, Sky News Weather, Storyful, PeopleTV, Times Now, USA Today, USA Today SportsWire and The Wall Street Journal.
What’s missing: Ticker News (Australia’s first & original news service which is free everywhere), MSNBC (try Fetch) and CBSN (try Paramount+).
Can you use Multiview: Yes, but depends on the device.
Audience target: 50,000 subs will generate $4.8m annually, 100,000 will get $9.6m. Modest amounts when Kayo could be generating around $300m annually.
Kayo, Binge and Flash chief executive Julian Ogrin told Mediaweek that a news service was the obvious next platform to tackle after Kayo Sport and Binge.
“When we built Kayo we did have ideas about both Binge and Flash as our next projects. We feel Flash is going to do to news what Kayo did to sport. It will be very much driven by live news with over 20 live news feeds.
“There will also be near real-time updates in a video-on-demand environment.
“Binge is different in that it is about the user scheduling what they want to watch on their terms at a convenient time.”
Not a lot is new to people with Foxtel subscriptions, where news is part of the basic package. But that’s the point – this is for people who want cheap access to news services that currently mostly only exist behind paywalls.
Foxtel Flash launch at Gravity Studios, Artarmon. Picture: Foxtel / Brett Costello
News feeds that Foxtel doesn’t have include the controversial Angelos Frangopoulos-led GB News, David Koch’s ausbiz and state-owned news channel France24.
Two omissions that users might like would be Ticker News and MSNBC. “We are in discussions with several other news sources, both locally and globally,” said Ogrin without being more specific.
Ogrin added the priority had been to get most of the larger news brands on board. “We are also looking to expand into areas where a service might cater to a particular demographic.”
With Kayo costing $25, Binge starting at $10, Ogrin and his team really needed a single figure monthly price point and they have achieved that.
“It is great value, and especially when you consider the number of devices a subscriber can watch on across the week to suit them at different times of the day – at home, at work or on a commute.”
Ogrin was not able to share audience targets, but it will be much smaller than the 1m+ audiences paying for the company’s other products. “Our research uncovered a lot of news fanatics who are prepared to pay for it. Flash is news for the streaming generation. Over 70% of households have streaming services and that will grow to over 85% in the next few years. Over 80% of Australians now consume news regularly.”
Most do that of course via FTA news services. Yet Flash only needs to make a small inroad into that audience to start building a sustainable business. Ogrin: “We have seen major changes in streaming and also how people consume news. When you bring that together we think this is a mass-market segment.”
Flash CTO Les Wigan at launch event
Flash launch event
In the time of Covid, virtual launch events are nothing, er, Flash. Julian Ogrin and his executive streaming team kept things simple with their launch this week.
Special guest was Communications Minister Paul Fletcher who took time out from his book tour to call the new venture “an exciting new service”.
Julian Ogrin did much of the heavy lifting, but he was ably backed up by executive director Kate de Brito, chief technical officer Les Wigan, and US-based director of product and development Brian Lenz.
Fox Sports’ Hannah Hollis then hosted a Q&A with the team.
See also: Foxtel’s 20-channel Flash streaming news service launching in October