While 54% of all households in Sweden at the end of 2019 subscribed to at least one online video streaming service, annual growth was sluggish to the point of suggesting that the market may be maturing, according to research from Nordic analyst Mediavision.
Netflix’s customer base remained stable at 1.6 million subscribers during last year, but the launch of Apple TV+ did not increase the number of streaming households considerably. The study also showed that service stacking was a real phenomenon and increasingly steadily. Nevertheless, Mediavision noted that several new streaming services are set for launch in 2020 and that these could push the market into a new wave of growth. Making the point, it cited Sweden’s Tele2's recently launched Com Hem Play+ and the soon to launch in the Nordics Disney+.
For the actors in the market, global as well as local, continued growth of the customer base is essential. Content costs were reaching new record-levels, also implying that customer growth is increasingly important moving into the new decade.
“The streaming market in Sweden has, after several years of strong growth, slowed down significantly during 2019,” said Marie Nilsson, CEO of Mediavision. “For the actors, global as well as local, this means increased competition. If household penetration doesn’t pick up, the players must rely on stacking in order to grow. But since we know that the starting field this year is strong, it is still too early to make any prediction about the outcome of 2020,” she added.