Why doesn't Sony have a major streaming service?

Submitted by Almighty_Push91 t3_11atop7 in movies

So, Of the Big 5 film studios, Sony seems to be the only one that doesn't have a major streaming service. Disney has Disney+, Universal has Peacock, WB has HBO Max, Paramount has Paramount+. I know that Sony owns Crunchyroll--which only caters to one genre, and technically there's the free Crackle service, but I'm just surprised that they haven't fully gone into the streaming wars with the others. Making a hub where they can include all of their TriStar and Columbia Pictures productions. Is there a reason for this? Do you think they'll eventually dive in and make one? Because they have a pretty extensive Library to pull from.

10

Comments

You must log in or register to comment.

mikeyfreshh t1_j9txnu2 wrote

I think streaming is going the other way and you're more likely to see some of these other streaming services fold. Sony understood the market was saturated and it's safer for them to just license their content to other streamers.

87

Owasso_Landman t1_j9u1oqf wrote

This is exactly what we are seeing with HBO. They are making more money licensing their work to cable channels.

19

puttinonthefoil t1_j9up780 wrote

But the stuff they’re licensing is still available on HBO Max. So they’re just getting it both ways.

6

GMW-5610 t1_j9u1ns6 wrote

Sony could have rivaled Apple if they played their cards well.

Imagine a Sony One service with Films and Music and Playstation games. Maybe make that an exclusive to Sony Xperias and Sony Tvs. Boom 💥

11

mikeyfreshh t1_j9u2y7h wrote

If they got into it 5-6 years ago you might be right. I think it's too late now. Nobody wants another streaming service at this point.

15

thune123 t1_j9v5nei wrote

Is Apple TV even that profitable? I never hear people talk about it and I doubt it's a driving force in people staying or moving over to apple. It just seems to be there. Obviously Itunes has its place but that's because its existed before streaming services were a thing but it never took off on other hardware companies. Spotify has taken the crown in that department. I'm sure it's a more popular app on the iPhone compared to iTunes.

Seeing all the financial info on streaming services it seems like Sony made the right move.

I don't like anyone is clamoring it rival Apple in the streaming department.

3

fosse76 t1_j9v6abr wrote

Apple has so much money, that I doubt any Apple TV losses even register. (I'm being facetious, sort of).

3

Midtownpatagonia t1_j9vhn7e wrote

I think apple is okay playing the long game with this like what they did with apple music.

There are some great content on apple tv but it will take them quite a long time to catch up to actual media companies’ book of content

3

garciaaw t1_j9vgia3 wrote

If you’re referencing the device itself, experience-wise, it’s a more refined product than Fire Stick or Roku. Profit-wise, unsure. It’s more expensive, so that’s a con, but there is a large Apple base that loves the walled garden it provides.

2

IvorTheEngineDriver t1_j9tywwp wrote

It's a smart move, they're selling their movies and show at a high price to other services ravenous for decent contents while Warner, Universal, Netflix etc. are just wasting spending billions...

21

TheCitizen616 t1_j9u0s81 wrote

They do, sorta.

When you buy a Sony Bravia TV, you can get access to Bravia Core, but only for a year(?). It has a large library of their titles available to stream at no additional cost for that year.

16

sir-fur t1_j9ulvcs wrote

Never knew that, that's actually a pretty sweet deal

4

Nisekoi_ t1_j9vj3cq wrote

also the bitrate is higher than a 4k Blu-ray.

−1

RecedingQuickly t1_j9vk7zk wrote

This is actually wrong, its about the same as a 4k blue-ray not higher then.

3

Nisekoi_ t1_j9vky8k wrote

Just checked No way home is around 80 mbps on it and around 55 mbps on 4k Blu-ray

−1

RecedingQuickly t1_j9z5i7o wrote

Cool but even sony themselves have said it achieves "near lossless uhd" which is similar to 4k blue-rays not better, who's right, the random on reddit or the creators of the service lol

1

sloppyjo12 t1_j9u2xhz wrote

How quickly so many forget about the legendary service that was PlayStation Vue

11

iDuddits_ t1_j9w7rt7 wrote

I was gonna say they already have a service but I guess it was me forgetting vue died back on like ps3 hah

1

FoxOntheRun99 t1_j9u0gze wrote

As we have seen lately, starting up a streaming service is incredibly expensive and you will be doing it at a loss for some time. Disney+ I read made a loss of $1.5 billion last year but they can absorb that loss, nonetheless they are looking at their expenditure. Paramount+ too.

SONY didn't look like it had an appetite to start and compete in this market and do they have the content to justify one? Instead they were savvy to strike seals with Disney, Netflix, etc to sell/licence their movies and TV shows to them. Makes a tidy profit for them in the long run so they can concentrate on making tentpoles. Yes Venom 3 is coming.

9

BeginningAppeal8599 t1_j9u32fp wrote

HBOMax always looked like it was saving money but now they're blatantly giving up

5

lightsongtheold t1_j9umne4 wrote

The reason why Sony have not launched a streaming service is pretty simple: they do not need to in order to maintain current revenue levels long term. Disney, NBCU, WBD, and Paramount make up a significant portion of their overall revenue from broadcast and cable services. That industry is in free fall thanks to Netflix and Amazon launching low cost, popular, streaming services. In order to chase that lost revenue the likes of Disney, NBCU, Paramount, and WBD have had to launch their own streamers. The problem is that is super expensive and needs heavy investment in the early years to rollout worldwide and to grow to scale. It will eventually be profitable for most of them.

Sony have not got the content to be truly competitive in an overly crowded streaming industry. They were always the weakest of the big studios. They also do not need to invest in streaming as they have very little revenue tied to the collapsing cable and broadcast industry. Sony do not need streaming because they did not have cable and broadcast businesses of note in most markets.

They did invest in niche anime streaming service Crunchyroll which looks an excellent pickup at the $1 billion they paid for it.

6

VULGARCAPS t1_j9wsld9 wrote

You write convincingly and with authority. I do not know if you know what you’re talking about, but I certainly believe that you do. Good job

3

ILoveMy-KindlePW t1_j9u2tal wrote

That's a good question actually, they could have gone with a similar strategy as Apple did (gifting months to people to use their hardware, either camaras, consoles or tv/phones) and they actually have a decent amount of self-produced movies and co-produced tv shows like Breaking Bad. The reality tho is that Sony as a whole doesn't have that much income itself at the movie/tv department as they are where they are because of their gaming department. They could invest on a streaming platform but the income for all of those services is not a safe bet (as netflix has been losing money since the start practically).

​

tldr; too much investment for an insecure market

5

DrRexMorman t1_j9ty8jb wrote

>I know that Sony owns Crunchyroll--which only caters to one genre, and technically there's the free Crackle service

Sony sold Crackle.

But it also runs PlayStation network.

That’s 2 streaming services.

4

Worthyness t1_j9u4c6o wrote

Technically had funimation too, but they merged it with crunchy.

3

TheCheshireCody t1_j9uh7qt wrote

Didn't they shut down the Playstation Network? I only ever rented one movie through PSN, and the buffering was so awful I never even considered it again.

0

DrRexMorman t1_j9ulm1p wrote

Sort of.

They definitely stopped producing content for it.

2

TheCheshireCody t1_j9uqiqb wrote

I must have been thinking of something else. PSN in my mind was just the service they rented/sold movies through for a while.

2

DrRexMorman t1_j9usc5e wrote

For a window of time Sony lost an extraordinarily large amount of money airing original content on PSN.

2

rhntr_902 t1_j9tzo0h wrote

DONT give them any more ideas for unnecessary streaming services, haha. It's so bad now that streaming packages are basically just channels we used to buy from the cable providers, especially with the inclusion of ads. Lol.

4

ConradBHart42 t1_j9uya9z wrote

Yeah, Sony Product Development Execs reading this random reddit thread! Don't get any ideas that thousands of people including yourself have already had when every other major content creation and holding house started up a streaming service!

3

Tarmac_Chris t1_j9ujj7a wrote

Part of the reason why Legendary studios signed on with Sony after the big breakup with WB was precisely because Sony have no streaming service.

4

AlanMorlock t1_j9txz8o wrote

The dorety secret is that it took many yesrs for Netflix to turn a profit and most ofnthe streaming services are operating at a loss. The infrastructure for running a streaming service is massively expensive.

3

MrTidels t1_j9u304z wrote

They do.

It’s called Bravia Core and only on their selected TV’s.

Pretty sure it’s practically a trial run though as you get a 24 month free trial with the TV but no way to contour once it expires

3

vafrow t1_j9uas86 wrote

Sony had Crackle, which never took off. I think that experience made them realize that it wasn't a game they were going to win, and, the better play is to take advantage of all the other players desperation for content , and sell their stuff at inflated prices.

3

Flash_Fox11 t1_j9unboh wrote

Do you really want another one

3

phdthrowaway2020 t1_j9ut30w wrote

Because Sony doesn't really care that much. Sony Pictures is less than 10% of Sony's annual revenue, so it just isn't worth the potential damage to the brand if it fails.

3

rage1026 t1_j9u34zy wrote

I think they use to have live tv streaming.

2

tetoffens t1_j9ujtsc wrote

They used to have PlayStation Vue. Used to subscribe and liked it compared to the other live TV streaming service options. Think it was a mistake to use the PlayStation branding though since it wasn't something exclusive to game consoles or had anything to do with video games.

2

joshuajjb2 t1_j9uvofu wrote

I heard they made a big deal with Netflix to put there content on Netflix first

2

LookAtThatBacon t1_j9u6cfa wrote

> Sony Pictures is able to survey the streaming landscape as a self-described “arms dealer” for the industry — a position Vinciquerra notes he’s happy to be in given the amount of money streamers are spending to compete. In addition to its deals with Netflix and Disney, the company also licenses and makes content for Amazon, Apple, Peacock and Warner Bros. Discovery.

Source

Looks like they like getting paid by every service and don’t want to deal with running their own major streaming service considering the cost to be competitive.

1

QuoteGiver t1_j9u7qub wrote

Presumably they know they’re not gonna end up as one of the top 3 that will survive.

1

naynaythewonderhorse t1_j9u950d wrote

I went through Crackle yesterday, and I was astonished by the amount of crap in there. So many clear rip-offs of other popular films that were one word off or something. In all, after like 500ish films I glossed through, I only recognized about 5 film names total.

It’s all just mediocre c-grade crap. At least Amazon and Tubi have good stuff, and truly horrendous stuff. Crackle is the stuff that no one else wanted.

1

lucia-pacciola t1_j9ubsbh wrote

Big Hollywood wanted a do-over on vertical integration, after the government made them give up their theater chains in Ancient Times. Since government regulators weren't stopping them from setting up their own streaming services, it seemed like the perfect opportunity to right the wrongs of history.

Probably the biggest payoff has been weakening Netflix as a streaming competitor. But this has mainly benefited Amazon, which actually has the war chest to keep competing with Netflix and with everyone else.

Sony is smart enough to stay out of this fight, and spend its money making content that other people want to buy.

1

MINKIN2 t1_j9usruk wrote

For a long time the only profitable Sony group was SCE/Playstation. They wouldn't want to add another money pit to their portfolio as they would have to start pumping out content to fill it.

I think it could be a good thing (especially for ourselves), if they just let their content rotate around the streaming platforms.

1

cronedog t1_j9vc18b wrote

>but I'm just surprised that they haven't fully gone into the streaming wars with the others.

Why? Have you seen how many 10s of billions streaming services have cost the studios?

​

I can see why Sony would only want upside instead of investing billions into another streaming service where 90% of the content consumers just steal the content.

1

Midtownpatagonia t1_j9vkcq9 wrote

Not enough content.

I mean they would probably want to couple this with the most successful piece of hardware in their arsenal: the playstation and PS online. This is the biggest in - millions of people have both the hardware and the service. They can couple it in to make it stickier to an already loyal fan base. But I argue that gamers don't really care about additional content as opposed to exclusive titles, game streaming, etc.

1

mikeweasy t1_j9vsqv5 wrote

That would be cool if they had one with all their stuff on it. It likely would be called "Sony+".

1

solo13508 t1_j9xc80k wrote

I just wish they'd make a deal with Disney to get the Spiderman films on Disney+. At least the MCU ones. Feels so weird having the MCU mostly all in one place except for the Spiderman trilogy. Well I guess there's Incredible Hulk too but I don't know how many are really missing that one lol

1