iWorld
17 mn SVoD homes to generate $ 1.8 bn in West Asia & Africa by ’22
MUMBAI: Middle East (West Asia) & North Africa OTT TV episodes and movies will generate revenues of US$1.75 billion by 2022; more than quadruple the US$428 million recorded in 2016.
According to the Middle East and North Africa OTT TV & Video Forecasts report, SVoD’s dominance of the sector will grow. SVoD revenues will reach $1.23 billion by 2022 (or 70% of the OTT total); nearly $1 billion more than the 2016 total (56% of OTT revenues).
Digital TV Research forecasts 17.27 million SVoD homes by 2022, up from 3.74 million recorded by end-2016. Turkey will remain the leader by some distance, having established a major local player as far back as 2011.
The top six regional platforms (Netflix, Amazon Prime Video, Icflix, Starz Play, Iflix and Shahid Plus) will account for 39% of the region’s SVoD subscribers by end-2022, up from 34% in 2016. Extracting Israel and Turkey, these six platforms will account for 78% of SVoD subscribers by 2022 – down from 88% in 2016.
Netflix will be the largest pan-regional SVoD platform by 2022, with an expected 3.26 million paying subscribers. This is more than quintuple the 2016 total. Longer-established Icflix will cross 2 million subscribers by 2022 – quadruple its 2016 total. Starz Play will add a further 1.60 million. Our forecasts of 695,000 subs for Iflix by 2022 only cover six of its eight current countries in the region.
Digital TV Research principal analyst Simon Murray said: “A handful of mobile operators such as Orange, Zain, Ooredoo, Etisalat and Vodafone have assets across several countries. SVOD platforms can gain considerable economies of scale by signing distribution deals with mobile operators. Deals between mobile operators and SVoD platforms are already prevalent in the Middle East and North Africa – offering an example for the rest of the world to follow.”
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iWorld
X launches XChat messaging app on iOS with calls and encryption
Standalone app marks shift from “everything app” vision, adds E2E messaging.
MUMBAI: From one big app to many small chats, X seems to be splitting its ambitions. X has rolled out its standalone messaging app, XChat, to iOS users, opening up a new front in its evolving product strategy. The app allows users to connect with existing X contacts through private and group messages, file sharing, as well as audio and video calls. The launch follows a limited beta phase, where the platform tested the product with a smaller user base to refine the experience. Now available publicly, XChat marks a notable pivot from earlier ambitions championed by Elon Musk to turn X into a single “everything app” combining messaging, payments, commerce and more.
Instead, the company under xAI ownership and backed by SpaceX appears to be building a suite of standalone applications, each targeting specific use cases while expanding its broader ecosystem.
At launch, XChat includes end-to-end encrypted messaging, PIN-based access, disappearing messages, and features such as message editing, deletion for all participants, and screenshot blocking. The company has also said the app is free from advertisements and tracking mechanisms, positioning it as a privacy-first alternative in a crowded messaging space.
However, security claims around the platform are likely to face scrutiny. Earlier iterations of XChat drew criticism from experts who argued it fell short of established encrypted platforms like Signal. With the wider rollout, the app is expected to undergo fresh evaluation to assess whether those concerns have been addressed.
Beyond messaging, XChat will also house X’s Communities feature, which is being discontinued on the main platform due to low usage and spam concerns. Migrating these users could provide an early boost to adoption, effectively turning XChat into both a communication and community hub.
The move underscores a broader recalibration at X less about cramming everything into one app, and more about spreading bets across multiple touchpoints, one message at a time.
