• Apple has reportedly hired an executive to push the licensing of content.
• This content will be licensed to foreign TV networks and stores for sale and rental.
• For now Apple isn’t looking to license to other streaming platforms but it could in future if this play doesn’t have the intended effect.

There was a time when Netflix enjoyed the exclusivity of being one of the sole streaming platforms online, well, legally streaming content at least. As Netflix’s bottom line grew, the temptation of launching a streaming platform was too much for production companies to ignore.

We now sit with a fragmented streaming market where a person needs multiple subscriptions to enjoy the content they want to watch. However, as it has become evident over time that running your own streaming platform is costly and there is little chance of success. As such there is an increasing amount of licensing of content going around.

The latest to be exploring the licensing of its content is Apple.

As reported by Bloomberg, Apple has hired an executive to license its original productions to other companies. This is an effort to not only improve visibility of Apple’s original content but also increase sales from that division.

However, don’t expect to see the next season of Severance on Netflix. According to the report, Apple will focus on licensing its content to “foreign TV networks and stores”. With these agreements, viewers can rent or buy movies and shows to watch.

This is all in service of improving the financial performance of Apple TV+ with a view to investing that money back into content production. While shows like Silo, Severance, Bad Monkey and others attract rave reviews from critics (ourselves included), those reviews don’t translate into subscriptions. So, Apple is almost forced to explore licensing in order to make money from its content.

Apple recently explored adding Apple TV+ to Amazon’s channel store, but it’s not clear how well this move is going for it at this stage as it’s too soon to tell.

It’s a smart move and one that could have been pulled out of the Netflix playbook. Before Netflix was available globally, it licensed its content to broadcasters in markets where it wasn’t available. Locals may recall seeing House of Cards and Orange Is The New Black on DStv/Mnet back in the pre-Netflix era. Once Netflix did arrive in South Africa it blew up and while it never mentioned it, we’re sure the licensing of its content helped prop up its reputation.

Granted, the practice of licensing is old given that production companies have been doing it for decades but it’s relatively new practice for streaming platforms. Warner Bros. Discovery, Paramount and Disney have all dabbled in licensing content with some even licensing that content to other streaming plaforms.

We look forward to licensing getting even more steam and eventually subscribing to a platform that only licenses content. Let’s face it, that’s the inevitable end-game here.