Fresh off $40 million in funding, streaming media company Plex today announced its expansion into a new business: in-store movie rentals. This additional feature will initially be available to customers in the US, giving streamers a new means of generating revenue beyond subscription products and ad-supported streaming, as the advertising market remains unpredictable. Therefore, diversification will prove to be important.
At launch, the marketplace will offer movies from top studios including WB, Paramount, MGM, Lionsgate, and A24. That means Plex users will be able to rent titles like “Barbie,” “Wonka,” and “Aquaman and His Kingdom.” “Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning,” “The Color Purple,” “Expend4bles,” “PAW Patrol: The Mighty Movie,” “Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes,” “Mean Girls,” and more.
Image credits: plex
Plex says there will be just over 1,000 titles available for rent starting at $3.99, but the number of titles will grow over time. As titles come and go during the period, the number of rentals will also fluctuate over time.
The company has been hinting at plans for the TV and movie rental market for years, but they never made it to the finish line as other priorities took over. Originally planned just before the COVID-19 pandemic, things changed as Plex, like many other companies, shifted its focus more towards an influx of streaming customers. There were other technical concerns that slowed things down at times.
But at this year's Consumer Electronics Show (CES), Plex acknowledged that the launch of a rental market is near. But as it turns out, the store will only feature movies for the time being, not TV shows. Additionally, Plex user research shows that rentals are in higher demand, so you can't purchase movies at the same time as renting them.
Image credits: plex
“We're looking at the purchase use case, because it creates more wrinkles. We have to keep this locker for people for a long time, but does it really make sense? Do you want it?” [for us]?,” Plex CEO Keith Valory explained. He said the shortage of TV show rentals also stems from user research, which found that while most people still rely on streaming services to watch TV, they are more interested in renting movies. He pointed out.
When users rent a movie, they can watch it for 30 days. As with other marketplaces, he has 48 hours from the time he starts the rental to complete the viewing. If he doesn't finish watching it on the first viewing, the movie will also appear in the “Continue Watching” section of his Plex home screen. The company plans to add more studio partners to its movie rental store in the future.
There are many other places where consumers can rent movies today, but Plex believes its recommendation capabilities will be a differentiator for its business. Today, Plex customers use its software to organize their home media, stream live channels, watch ad-supported TV and movies, and track their friends' viewing habits across the service or through new social networking features. I'm discovering new shows through it. (The latter recently landed Plex in hot water after customers discovered they had shared views of content they wanted to keep quiet.) (He stated that he has made it clearer that the
This large amount of user data could help Plex drive more users to movie rentals, the company said. For example, if your friend just saw a new movie that you have on your watchlist, you might want to rent it and watch it too.
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“I think we are way ahead of the market from a technology perspective when it comes to personalization and recommendations,” Valory says. “And to do that, we rely heavily on machine learning and other heuristics. One of the benefits of building a recommendation engine is that it applies to all content. I think so,” he added.
Of course, Plex also addresses being a studio partner when its software solution is actually used to store people's home media collections (including movies previously ripped from DVDs). Must be. But the company stresses that that's not an issue, as it works with its studio partners to provide protections and watermarks to deter illegal use and protect copyrights if something is infringed. are doing.
New movie marketplace launches on various platforms including Amazon Fire TV, Apple TV, Android TV/Google TV, Roku, smart TVs (LG, Hisense, Samsung, Sony, VIZIO), game consoles, and apps on Apple Plex says it will. Android smartphones and tablets.