Could Paramount Plus look more Like Pluto TV? Maybe. 2020 has been the year for a lot of things. Most of them have been unfortunate. And depending on how one looks at consolidation between media companies it might be seen as another in a series of unfortunate events. It depends on one’s perspective. But the reality is that mergers are bringing multiple brands under the same corporate umbrella. And we now have a few models as to what that can look like.
Tom Ryan, CEO of Pluto, TV will now have a much bigger job. The man behind the popular free tv streaming service will head of Viacom CBS’s transition from CBS All Access to the new Paramount Plus service as part of a new role as president and CEO of the newly created ViacomCBS Streaming. This includes overseeing CBS All Access, which will relaunch as Paramount Plus in early 2021, as well as Pluto TV. Paramount Plus is a rebranding of sorts for CBS All Access that was necessitated when Viacom merged with CBS, bringing an expanded catalog with it, sort of begging to be monetized.
The problem is that Comedy Central and Nick Jr have totally different content than CBS and would be a strange fit next to Blue Bloods if it were all meshed together without a bit of rethinking. One place where all of the content seems to play along nicely though is Pluto TV. The service which hit the scene as a startup was acquired by Viacom when it was still a separate company from CBS and became a nesting place for content from MTV, VH1, Nickelodeon along with the huge slate of partnerships Pluto TV had already built up. After CBS and Viacom merged to become ViacomCBS, predictably CBS content began to find its way onto Pluto TV as well most notably in the form of Star Trek Discovery and Picard. While not permanent residents on the free service it indicated that CBS saw what Pluto TV could do for its properties.
Now it appears that CBS wants to see what the person behind Pluto TV company can do with the entire digital portfolio. ViacomCBS has not indicated exactly how Paramount + will work once it launches in 2021. But users can be sure that the service will get a facelift. We have some examples of how to integrate multiple media properties.
Disney+ launched a service that breaks each of its brands into separate families and separate menus with branded intros. It’s sort of like each brand is its own app. Warner Media/AT&T launched HBO Max which seeks to blend everything from HBO, Turner’s media empire, along with acquired content like South Park and The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air. The service still has hubs for the nine featured brands on the service but overall the app resembles HBO Max or HBO with a purple tint. At the moment the majority of the real estate on the app is taken up with HBO content. Peacock on the other hand combines all of the brands from NBC, USA, Syfy and so on into one large interface with that esily blends USA Network content with NBC hits along with the rest of the Comcast content. The setup is not unlike Hulu, which NBC still partially owns. The service highlights free content from across multiple brands including a live grid section called channels. Is that what is in store with Paramount Plus? It sounds like that’s where it’s going.
“ViacomCBS has a unique opportunity to combine the best of our brands in a seamless ecosystem of must-watch, direct-to-consumer services for audiences around the world,” Bob Bakish, president and CEO of ViacomCBS, said in announcing the changes. “As we plan for the launch of Paramount Plus, bringing together the leaders of our streaming platforms to create a unified global organization will enable us to execute a holistic strategy across both free and pay.”
Ryan is expected to “ensure a more holistic approach across both free and pay streaming,” as well as more closely align the company’s streaming initiatives globally and enhance its ability to “leverage the cross-house franchise and content strength of ViacomCBS to seize the global opportunity in streaming.”
Not utilizing Ryan’s experience would be a big mistake. So it looks like ViacomCBS understands what it has and where it is going.
