• Africa, the last digital frontier
• American Market stagnant
• Deals struct after years of being ignored
• What the business looks like content wise
• Digital connection of digital colonization?

Africa, seemingly is the last digital frontier with streaming platforms now aware there is money to be made. After decades in which African talent (actors, directors, script writers) as well as the African market were globally neglected, ignored, or dismissed, through clear racial bias, a new reality has dawned. The unlikely has finally happened: deals upon deals have been inked between African film & TV producers and global studios & streamers.

What does this new digital horizon look like?

Nigerian TV pioneer Mo Abudu describes this momentous and historic shift as a tipping point for African content. Abudu’s company, EbonyLife Media, cleverly anticipated this change and dexterously pivoted to leverage more lucrative deals, amplifying the growing business of production, particularly with international streamers. His was the first African company to sign a multititle deal with Netflix for a slew of features including human trafficking drama Oloture, domestic abuse drama Blood Sistersand the period epic Death and the King’s Horseman, based on the 1975 play by Nigerian Nobel Prize winner Wole Soyinka.

Several series are also on the company’s slate, including Nigerian legal drama Castle & Castle, about a husband and wife who run a law firm, and dystopian sci-fi series, Nigeria 2099, a co-production with AMC. Reclaim is a six-part heist thriller (a co-production deal between EbonyLife and BBC Studios) which follows a team of art thieves looking to steal back Nigerian works poached by the British Empire 125 years ago; while an historical action series is being developed with Sony Pictures Television about the all-female West African army, the Dahomey Warriors, which was a prototype of the fictional Dora Milaje of Marvel’s Black Panther.

The smell of money.

And the streamers have come. Amazon has signed two major licensing deals with Nigeria’s Inkblot Studios and Anthill Studios, its first agreements with African production companies. The Walt Disney Company has confirmed that its Disney+ streaming service will launch in South Africa in May. In an emailed statement, the group said the service will launch in the country and other territories on 18 May with a very competitive pricing menu at R119 per month or R1,190 for an annual subscription.

To date, Netflix has had the lions share with its service accounting for more than half of the continent’s streaming subscriptions. Having debuted its first African originals in 2020, Netflix content has by and large been well received and boasts several hits like South African spy thriller Queen Sono and Cape Town teen drama Blood & Water as well as Netflix’s first Nigerian commission, King of Boys: The Return of the King, a seven-part series sequel to Kemi Adetiba’s hit 2018 gangster drama King of Boys. Additionally, there are several non-English films set in West and East Africa to be produced.

Netflix and the studios are pitching their African investment as an overdue remedy to how Hollywood has long portrayed the continent and its people.

“In the past, African stories have been told by outsiders. We want to help local talent bring their stories to the world,” said Ben Amadasun, director of content in Africa for Netflix, in an interview with ‘The Hollywood Reporter’.

Digital connection of digital colonization?

The global investment in African content is part of a broader strategy by studios and streamers to copy the successful Netflix model by producing local content for local audiences. It is well known that subscription numbers for Netflix in North America are stagnant and that growth in many territories, including Western Europe, is slowing. But Africa, particularly sub-Saharan Africa, is an untapped market. Given that the sub-Saharan SVOD (subscription video-on-demand) income is still small at $107 million in 2021, the potential as Africa gears towards the 4^th Digital Migration will be in the billions. It is incumbent for African producers to realise that this is a moment of reckoning. Where and how will we position talent, directors and story-tellers in this new frontier? Are we witnessing a digital colonization or will we be strategic by also making universal stories which will resonate with the world. Only time will tell.