VietNamNet Bridge - Following the market entry of Netflix, Danet, Fim Plus and Amazon Prime, Vietnamese online copyright films have a new competitor -- ClipTV from Vega. 

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In the competition for market share, Vietnamese VOD (video on demand) suppliers appear to have bigger advantages.

Amazon has recently decided to expand its Prime Video service in more than 200 countries, including Vietnam. Amazon Prime is the second foreign company to provide copyrighted film services in Vietnam, after Netflix, which arrived in Vietnam in January 2016.

Though foreign service providers are considered rivals with plentiful film stores, they are far from a threat to Vietnamese VOD suppliers. 
Though foreign service providers are considered rivals with plentiful film stores, they are far from a threat to Vietnamese VOD suppliers. 

The biggest problems of foreign companies are the limited number of films with subtitles in Vietnamese. Besides, the service providers only accept payment via credit cards, while Vietnamese often prefer cash payments. 

Luong Cong Hieu, CEO of Fim Plus, pointed out a series of disadvantages that foreign companies bear. First, they provide cross-border services with uncensored content. 

Second, Netflix, for example, applies a single service fee for all markets, which is too high for some Vietnamese.

Users have to pay VND170,000 a month to watch SD (standard) films on one device.


Vietnamese Fim Plus (Galaxy) and Danet (BHD) became better known in the VOD market after they launched advertising campaigns on TV shows and buses, and organized dialogues about VOD.

When asked why they decided to join the online copyrighted film market, representatives of Galaxy and BHD both said distributing through cinema systems alone would not bring profits. Online film services are a way to increase revenue.

This is also seen in other countries. The revenue that cinemas accounts for 30-50 percent of total revenue, while the remaining 50-70 percent is from pay TV and VOD.

The VOD market has a newcomer – ClipTV – which will arrive on December 20. ClipTV is provided by Vega, a firm known for its internet and added value services. 

It was a surprise that an internet and added value service firm jumped into the VOD market. ClipTV is described as an ‘interesting unknown’ in the market, as US copyrighted films are expensive.

Meanwhile, sources said there would be one more foreign name in the market early next year – iFlix, which has received a $45 million investment package from Sky to implement the plan to expand its business in the Asian market.

The Vietnamese copyrighted film market which has been running since 2014, remains very small, because Vietnamese prefer watching film for free.

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