Entertainment Content Creation on Verge of Major Disruption via Digital Transformation – Vince Pizzica
By Lane F. Cooper, Editorial Director, BizTechReports
It is difficult to imagine a sector that has done more to alter consumer behaviors and expectations than the digital entertainment technology (ET) sector. The intuitive ability to access almost any experience (music, moving pictures, games, etc.) from any source at any time on any device has set the standard for how the rest of the economy addresses demand while fending off competition.
Over-the-top (OTT) streaming service providers have put pressure on traditional broadcasters and theatrical venues to up their game, as consumer electronics (CE) manufacturers participate in a frenetic race to rollout feature-rich phones, tablets, TVs, gaming consoles – and more – that are easier and more intuitive than ever to use.
Taken together, the good folks at PwC expect the Global Entertainment & Media market to hit a whopping $2.9 trillion in annual sales by 2026, as unhindered innovation is fueled by the adoption of cloud platforms, emerging technologies – like artificial intelligence (AI) – and novel business models.
That said, one segment of the industry that has lagged a bit in breaking with its strategic, operational and technological past: the high-production values content creation community.
To listen to the podcast interview with Vince Pizzica, click here.
"When it comes to high-production content creation – the big movies, TV shows and live events that continue to drive consumer engagement – we haven't really seen a lot of change in over a hundred years," says Vince Pizzica in a podcast interview for journalists.
A veteran c-suite executive and board advisor in the technology, media and telecommunications (TMT) space, Pizzica has spent the past four decades influencing the strategic direction of major companies in the sector – including Telstra, Siemens, Alcatel, Lucent and Technicolor – while guiding a new generation of ET players who promise to completely redirect the trajectory of the industry (see sidebar).
On the Cusp of a Content Creation Revolution
The reasons for the content creation community's resistance to change are many and varied. According to Pizzica, the more important and urgent issue today is that the entire segment is in the midst of rapid and dynamic change that is only just starting.
Like so many other conventions and traditions that have characterized the behavior of mainstream industries, the COVID-19 pandemic has played a significant role in challenging norms and realigning organizational power structures.
For the longest time, despite the presence of high-performance networks and cloud resources that could have enabled more efficient parallel processes for content creation, security concerns were often cited by senior executives in the industry who eschewed a shift away from expensive and inefficient serial content creation processes.
"Studios wouldn't let creative talent work remotely because they were worried that people would take selfies of what was on their screen or in some other fashion allow important material to leak during the production process," explains Pizzica.
The pandemic forced the industry to explore new workflows that embraced virtual production and collaboration while validating and emboldening millennials – and the next generation of creatives – who do not want to be tied down.
COVID-19 also threw the economic structure of high-production value content into flux. With consumers worldwide sheltering in place, theatrical releases were suspended, and tough decisions were made to allow streaming-first distributions.
In response, a plethora of new major streaming providers entered the market to further fragment audiences, challenging prevailing models for premium content monetization.
"In just a few short years, we have rapidly shifted from an environment in which audiences were measured in terms of tens-of-millions every year to a situation today in which two or three million viewers are now considered a big audience. Indeed, measuring audiences has become much more difficult. Companies like Netflix don't really tell you how many people are watching a stream," says Pizzica.
The net result: the content creation community is coming to grips with a paradigm shift that moves away from decision-making based on mass-market assumptions alone. Instead, they are learning to survive and thrive in a long-tail economy.
"If producers want to reach an audience that's very targeted and segmented, they have to develop new production processes that meet the still-high expectations of consumers in a cost-efficient manner," he explains.
Technology-enabled Supply Chain Thinking
The good news is that technologies, business models and creative options are rapidly maturing to support the new economic realities faced by the content developers and owners. Many of the core business-technology principles are being leveraged from the just-in-time supply chain management experiences that completely altered the manufacturing sector decades ago.
Content creators are establishing ecosystem-wide collaboration frameworks that make it possible to be faster, cheaper, and better. In the process, the digital links that bind different elements of production are rapidly maturing.
"Beyond this, advances in virtual production – illustrated by Disney's award-winning Mandalorian series – also offers insights into how technology can be leveraged to bring high-production values to niche audiences," says Pizzica.
With today's augmented and virtual reality (AR/VR) applications, production teams do not have to go to the Sahara Desert to film a realistic scene.
"They can just stay in Hollywood or Bollywood or Canada or wherever great creative talent is present and save millions of dollars by not having to relocate," he says.
These savings, however, will only manifest themselves if the digital production environments are used effectively and efficiently. And this, states Pizzica, is where the rubber meets the road.
"While demand for high-quality content remains strong, award-winning accolades – and profits – will flow to those that develop the organizational competencies, creative skill sets and compelling technology-enabled business models for bringing their stories to market," he concludes.
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EDITORIAL NOTE: To listen to the podcast interview with Vince Pizzica, click here