Verizon and AwesomenessTV have confirmed that their plans for an exclusive premium video content service have officially been canceled. The service, which was initially announced back in April 2016 when Verizon acquired a 24.5% stake in AwesomenessTV, was initially expected to be an all-new video content platform that would run alongside Verizon’s go90 service. Now, though, it appear’s Verizon has had a change of heart and has decided to instead develop more programs for go90. So far AwesomenessTV has already produced a number of go90-exclusive programs but now the company’s focus will be solely on exclusive content for the service.
It’s no secret that Verizon hasn’t had the best of success with go90 so the push for new and exclusive content is perhaps unsurprising to many. Considering AwesomenessTV’s focus on teenagers and young adults, though, the content that will eventually be coming to go90 could be just what it needs in order to continue growing its subscriber numbers. Verizon has also been reported to be making the most of the developers it acquired back in October with the buyout of Vessel. It’s claimed the company is using the employees in order to redevelop go90 in order to make it more user-friendly and improve the overall experience in order to match those of Netflix and even YouTube, something that is important to young audiences, especially those who consume most of their content on mobile platforms.
With the video content market already nearing saturation point, though, the struggles that Verizon face are certainly not easy to overcome, especially with content providers such as Hulu or Netflix investing so much money into exclusive content as well as rights to other series. Nonetheless, Verizon appears to have a clear plan of how it’s going to grow the service and, if the last six months are anything to go by, the plan is working. The only downside is that, as of now, go90’s speed of growth is still pretty slow. It’ll remain to be seen if Verizon can successfully turn itself into a content provider and move away from its traditional carrier-focused strategy but what is certain is that the company doesn’t have an easy road ahead, especially considering its competitors.