Spanish-speaking territories (Spain, Central and South America, excluding Brazil) are fast-growing SVOD markets, with local audiences increasingly turning to digital subscription services. Ampere Analysis' polling data shows that at Q1 2020, 66% of Mexican internet households were using at least two subscription services. This reflects a wider trend, with the proportion of multi-service households also growing in Argentina (50%) and Spain (49%).
The Hispanic region currently accounts for nearly 14% (26.4 million subscribers at Q2 2020) of Netflix's global subscriptions. Mexico, which counts 8 million subscribers at Q2 2020, is Netflix's largest Spanish-speaking market, followed by Spain (4.5 million), Argentina (3.8 million) and Colombia (2.6 million). However, the share of Spanish-language programming offered on the service is still limited. At Q1 2020, only 8% of the content available on Netflix's platforms in Mexico and Spain was Spanish-language.
International streamers have been ramping up their local production efforts, while capitalising on Hispanic content's global appeal to leverage their investments. Following the creation of its first European production hub in Madrid in 2019 and the opening of its Latin American headquarter in Mexico City earlier this year, Netflix is now the largest commissioner of Spanish-language content globally with 25 shows currently in production or development. Amazon comes second with 18 upcoming Hispanic shows, followed by Spanish public broadcaster RTVE with 17 shows currently commissioned.
The multiplication of distribution channels and the recent launch of several direct-to-consumer platforms have boosted the global demand for content. This means there are also new revenue opportunities for traditional Spanish TV groups, which lie not only in the production of original content for third parties, but also on library licensing deals.