On the cusp of an entertainment revolution
Once he believes in the business potential of an idea, iFlix country manager Sherwin dela Cruz would always jump in – with both feet, without hesitation. He called himself a “serial entrepreneur.” Before joining iFlix he built his career managing a number of start-up companies involved in trade and entertainment industries.
Of course, some things don’t work out the way he wants them to but Sherwin doesn’t stop venturing into entrepreneurship. He believes that it is okay to fail, as long as one gives his all to whatever venture he pours his heart and soul into. Failure is no excuse to stop challenging oneself.
iFlix Country Manager Sherwin dela Cruz. PHOTOS BY ANDREA DELA CRUZ
Sherwin’s business ventures might not have worked out, but he learned many things along the way that helped him in managing iFlix Philippines. Since co-founding one of the biggest subscription video on-demand service companies in Southeast Asia in 2014, iFlix has grown at a rate that went beyond his expectations.
“Three years after iFlix was launched in the Philippines, the first country that the company launched at, we are now in 28 countries across Asia and Africa, with over 30 offices employing 800 people. We have 20 million active users, to date. Five million of which have activated in the Philippines, and 1.8 million active users. About 500,000 people use our app every single day and we are looking to boost this to around 3 million in the next few years,” shared Sherwin who is Communications Technology Management graduate of Ateneo De Manila University.
Sherwin shared that things have changed so much, from the knowledge of the people about the industry to how people consume digital contents down to the very technology – the video quality, buffering (the lack of it), bandwidth usage, among others.
When iFlix first launched, the question revolved around “What is streaming?” But it has shifted to “What differentiates you from other services?” People start looking for what more they can get from their subscription.
With all these changes, Sherwin has been amazed at how quick everything happened. “Everything has changed in such a short time. When you see it, everything seems to be leading to this – with people taking the driver’s seat on how they watch video. Now, they are more capable to watch content whenever, wherever and however they want,” he pointed out.
He observes how the viewing habits of the Filipinos are constantly changing. “Years ago, the Filipino viewers had to rush home to catch their favorite drama. Once upon a time, a lot people were dictating something for someone like the daily TV schedule. Prime time is between 8 p.m. to 9 p.m. But that is not everyone’s prime time. Telling someone to watch something from 8 p.m. to 9 p.m. on a Thursday night is just absurd.”
The self-confessed techie believes that everything is riding on the momentum of the internet. “I’m an avid newspaper reader. But eventually, half of what I read on newspaper about yesterday in the morning, I already know, and I knew it when it happened. One hour into the news, everything is on the internet.”
He puts premium on having control. “Now, people can watch television while browsing through their gadgets.
They can watch on their mobile phones, tablets, laptop, desktop or connect the video on their television.”
These have domino effect on the digital suppliers. About 10 years ago, contents are so precious that most distributors would keep a strict time line on viewers’ video consumption. Let’s say, a movie came out. There is a window – about four months – before the home videos (DVDs, VCDs etc) would come out. Then, the video company would hold it back before releasing on cable networks. But now, these video suppliers sell their contents directly on digital platforms.
“Sometimes, they would even skip TV and go directly to a legit digital video platform. With this trend, the market is adapting quickly,” shared Sherwin whose typical day revolves around analyzing data streams, dictating library content that their company provides and meeting with his people. In between, he plays as hard as herworks and adheres to iFlix’s tagline – Let’s Play – by heart.
When iFlix moved from their shared office space with their sister company Ensogo to their new office in BGC, Sherwin didn’t want to have his own office cubicle. He didn’t want a traditional office setting, and opted for a fun, cool place where everyone can just work wherever they want.
He’s a cool boss like that, but he is also quite serious when it comes to business. He studies and takes note of how Filipinos consume contents – what they want to watch, how much they willing to pay, and how satisfied they are with what iFlix is offering.
The Philippines, he revealed, has one of the highest number of active iFlix subscribers in the region, second or third biggest market, next to Indonesia and tied with Malaysia. On average, a Filipino watches 210 minutes per day.
The only challenge is the slow internet speed, which iFlix has already addressed by tailoring the video’s quality to the device it will be streamed to – smallest files goes to iPhone 4 and its Android equivalents, while medium quality files will be sent to iPhone 6 or its equivalent devices, and the highest quality files go to TV streaming devices.
Sherwin and his team worked on reducing latency by having all local content streamed from servers located in the Philippines. Another strategy to take the bigger pie of the market is “hyperlocalization,” filling up their digital library with local movies and drama, which most of their Filipino subscribers still prefer watching.
All these strategies require investment, and Sherwin revealed that iFlix is still in its investment phase.
“Let’s get it out in the open. There is no single subscription video demand service in the market that has made profits ever. Not a single one of them. We are changing the people’s behavior. Lots of people are going here, investing on content and creating values. It is an economic scheme. We want to show so much content, everyone has much choices but we need to get a wider base of people to watch them.”
But more than just making the value proposition more appealing to the customers, Sherwin focuses on revolutionizing the entertainment scene.
“By market percentage, we are one of the leaders, if not The leader. But we don’t rally think about it. We have so many things to do. The untapped market in the Philippines is so huge. We have 1.8 million active users, and there is about 100 million Filipinos. Tapping 2 percent of the market is not yet a revolution. If more and more people adapt to what we are offering on a daily basis, then we are on our way to an entertainment revolution.”
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