Australian Content in SVOD Catalogs: Availability and Discoverability – 2019 edition

This is the third in a series of annual reports into local content availability and discoverability on subscription video-on-demand (SVOD) services in Australia. Since 2017, we have used catalog research methods to study the quantity and characteristics of Australian content carried by Stan and Netflix Australia. Our 2017 report was a submission to the Australian and Children’s Screen Content Review. Our 2018 report assessed the changing SVOD landscape twelve months later. This year’s report is notable for the addition of Amazon Prime Video, which has a distinctive catalog structure that presents several research and policy challenges. The present report also includes new analysis of the format, genre and age of local content offered across these three services. Data was collected in August 2019. This study considers only commercial SVOD services with a curated catalog of professional content. Due to the nature of our research questions, we have excluded the catch-up services subject to local content requirements (Foxtel Go/Now, SevenPlus, 9Now, TenPlay), public-service media (ABC iView, SBS On Demand), linear IPTV services (Fetch), video-sharing services (YouTube) and smaller SVODs with limited market share in Australia (Mubi, Hayu). Nor do we consider Apple TV Plus or Disney Plus, which are yet to launch in the Australian market at the time of writing. Netflix and Amazon Prime Video have different catalogs in each country, however our study refers only to the localised Australian version of each service (i.e., the catalog accessible to users with an Australian IP address)