Two things happened this week that are likely to change how Africans see films and television. Ghana’s Mobilefliks announced that it will be launching its internet and app-based short film and mobisode service on 5 November and on last Friday 18 October Nigerian film-maker Obi Emelonye had a global online premiere for his latest film (in Igbo) Onye Ozi (The Messenger). I spoke to Juliet Asante and Obi Emelonye about what all this might mean.

Juliet Asante’s Mobileflik’s service will launch on 5 November 2013 in both Ghana and Nigeria: with MTN and Airtel (using its Airtel Money product) in Ghana and through MTN Play in Nigeria. It is also working towards an agreement with Tigo in Ghana. Asante also wants to get to a position where the app is pre-installed on handsets, particularly local RLG handsets and imports.

Initially it will only be accessed on smartphones. The films and mobisodes will not be longer than 10 minutes and currently the company has produced the first set in-house. However, it will be training external producers and directors to produce the quality they want. It has 2 series of 13 mobisides and 2 films. According to Asante:”The idea is to do 4 new movies and a series every month, going up to 10 movies over time.”

The stories are popular entertainment. For example, a group of students go to a party. One is killed. Who did it? Another is about a women who has a baby that is from an affair with her brother’s husband. She and the child have to take a DNA test to get a US visa. What will she do?

The app to access the mobisodes and films can be downloaded from an app store, a web store or from their own web site. It has completed the Android app and is working to complete apps for the Blackberry and iPhone handsets.

In terms of payment, in Ghana it will be one Cedi to purchase a movie or you can pay less to live stream 2-3 views. The equivalent in Nigeria will be US$1 equivalent in Naira to purchase or US50 cents to stream.

Asante estimates that Android phones are somewhere between 45-50% of the total smartphone market in Ghana. Both Nokia and Blackberry have lost market share in this segment and iPhone has almost no penetration. As importantly, she says that there is data showing that 30-35% of all handsets in the Ghanaian market are smartphones.

On the all important revenue split with the mobile operators and other parties, it has a 60/40 split in MTN’s favour. With Airtel, there is a third party VAS provider (Rancard) Airtel has allowed them to keep the full Cedi spent but added GHC20-30 cents to the users bill to pay Rancard. In Nigeria, it has been arranged with VAS2Net as the SMS aggregator:”Long-term, we’re obviously looking to improve the percentages in our favour but we didn’t want that negotiation to get in the way of launching.”
So how many people might use the service? ”There’s a lack of entertainment on mobile phones in Africa so we feel it could be used in the medium term by 30% of the market. It’s designed to be used in people’s downtime, like when you’re on a bus with 10 minutes to spare, you can watch a movie.
Its product on Airtel is hosted here http://www.airtelmoneymarket.com/gh-merchant-EagleProductions-id-168-p-1-l-20.html

This is also the link to the mobilefliks site that will go live in a couple of weeks: http://www.mobilefliks.com/

Obi Emelonye has a global online premiere for his latest film Onye Ozi

Obi Emelonye’s latest film Onye Ozi (The Messenger) is an Igbo film about a Nigerian who comes to London to get rich. At his arrival party, a white man walks into the party pursued by someone who shoots him. Everyone flees to avoid trouble except the film’s protagonist who helps the man, who gives him an envelope and some keys.

Emelonye decided that it would have a global online release. So why did he decide to go this route? His last film Last Flight To Abuja was put up on You Tube and has attracted 1.5 million views. His calculation is that if only say 10,000 people watch the new film at US$2 per view, then he will have an income stream that didn’t exist before.

In practical terms, the film premiere was physically in London last Friday at the Lighthouse in Camberwell with a Google Hangout to see the red carpet and a live stream of the movie at the same time as everyone else was watching. It was made available through iROKO, Ibaka Tv and Afrinolly. However, it was streamed to those services by Emelonye’d distributor Distrify who kept the master copy on its server. Then the film will open again physically in Lagos later in November.

To see Obi Emelonye talk about the launch, click on the link below:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jjV8MNBU2yY

To know more about iROKO, click on the video clip interview link with Michael Ugwu below:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2bq-_I49rl0

To know more about Afrinolly, click on the video clip interview link with Chike Maduegbuna below:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6Nap_0CJ9K4

In Brief

- Kenya: Kahenya Kamunu’s streaming service using a box based on a Raspberry Pi is gearing up for its November launch:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OY2qK4HFFBA

SOURCE: http://smartmonkeytv.com