2015-06-10

Traditional Media VS.Online Media

The forum of the Shanghai TV Festival was held yesterday. Pic by Shi Peiqi

At the forum of the Shanghai TV Festival yesterday, the speakers said that Chinese TV and broadcasting firms, which are facing challenges of decreased numbers of audience and advertising income, are seeking new opportunities with the Internet Plus plan through capital platforms, unique content and convergence of Internet and mobile network.

"The whole industry is facing challenges such as surge of online video websites and new video watching habits, which makes the TV media a relatively sluggish industry. In 2014, the advertising income of traditional media including TV and newspapers dropped by 4.7 percent year-on-year, the biggest drop in the recent five years." said Wang Jianjun, Shanghai Media Group’s head.

“Ostrich policy and refusal of changes is a dead end for us. On contrast, we have to embrace the change and innovation.” Wang spoke at the forum called Disruption and Revival: Internet Plus Media Convergence Summit.

With asset integration as well as the convergence of Internet and content, the market value of SMG’ s new media arm has jumped to 180 billion yuan (US$29 billion) recently, compared with 70 billion yuan a year ago. It now ranks No. 5 among all Chinese dot-com firms.

"SMG has invested heavily to establish an online content center and internal innovation system, which better combines the requirement of the capital market with the convergence of Internet and TV." said Ling Gang, president of BesTV, SMG’s listed new media arm.

Mango TV, an online video website under Hunan TV station, expected its advertising income to be 800 million yuan this year compared with 80 million in 2014, getting 10 times higher within a year.

Mango TV broadcasts unique TV dramas and reality-show programs online, which are its advantages on content and attractive to consumers.

The IP or intellectual property resources make TV stations competitive compared with online video websites which highly depend on content purchase and distribution.