MultiChoice the parent company of Digital Satellite Television (DStv) and GOtv — recently unveiled plans to make DStv Now a stand-alone service by March 2020. Currently, one cannot download the video streaming app from the Playstore or App Store and login and subscribe without a premium account. This means to view content on the app, you must have a decoder connected to a satellite dish and an active DStv subscription.
Introduced in 2014, to respond to the growing Video on Demand (voD) platforms, DStv Now provides its users with their content like movies, sports, and reality TV shows on mobile phones and tablets. Later, the company unveiled its DStv Now app on Apple TV, Smart TVs, and Android TV on media players running .
According to MyBroadband, the company will be independently launching DStv Now before the end of March 2020, after it is done with the current extensive external testing. MultiChoice’s Connected Video CEO, Niclas Ekdahl said they are about to hit field trials, following last year’s announcement to roll out in this fiscal year.
Once DStv Now is separated from the decoder subscription, users would be able to access their content without owning a decoder. With this new model, there is some speculation that the upcoming DStv standalone service will work like Netflix when it comes to subscription. It still remains to be seen if users will only pay a monthly subscription to access all of DStv’s content or subscribe for various plans.
ALSO READ: Detailed Guide to Streaming in Uganda- 2019
They will have to set competitive prices viz a viz the content they offer — as one can a get Netflix subscription for as low as $9.99 which is not the case for the DSTV Now service which is more pricey. Clearly, they have still have a lot of kinks to work out as soon as the testing phase is done.
Either-way, it would be great to see how a standalone DStv Now app fairs in Africa’s struggling VoD market that has a few players like ShowMax.
 and GOtv — recently unveiled plans to make DStv Now a stand-alone servic){kind=link}