TV Programmers See Big Opportunities in Mobile Phones

“The color screen allowed the consumer to make the connection between something they had in their home -- the TV -- with the cell phone,” said Airborne Entertainment co-founder Andy Nulman: “People are now viewing mobile devices the fourth screen alongside film, TV and video. The color screen was the tipping point to allow us to be where we are today.”

Although many upstart companies are developing unique content for mobile, Michael Arrieta, senior vp-Sony Pictures Digital, said Hollywood is staking its claim as the leader in providing content. “Mobile is a great new medium but it’s not instead of; it’s in addition to. Verizon is as important to Sony as Comcast is. Networks aggregate lots of eyeballs, and mobile is another way to do cross-platform programming. If you can program a mobile phone in conjunction with other platforms, you get an exponential effect. There will be programming unique to mobile but it’s the pulling together that will truly be innovative… Consumers seem to have an unlimited appetite for games and video.”

Arrieta said the studios were pleasantly surprised to discover people are willing to pay for complementary services. “We've had great success in expanding certain brands, such as Wheel of Fortune. We have hundreds of thousands of people who subscribe so they can play the game on their mobile device. As the networks change and new opportunities are enabled, head to head play, video clips will be available. Fifteen million fans watch the show, but only 2 or 3 times a week… That means they are still missing it 2 times a week. So the mobile handset becomes the tool for getting the show when you miss it. People will pay for it because they already do. We're looking to do it with other brands people love.”

Although the studios and networks may not see an immediate return on their investment, the potential of mobile has made it an important business strategy, speakers said. Twentieth TV Exec. Vp Marisa Fermin said studios and networks learned a valuable lesson from having not seen the true potential of cable years ago: “Cable TV has become huge and has fractionalized the audience. Now we know we have to be in there at the very beginning. To jump in now may not be the huge revenue stream at the moment but we have to come up with ways to bring in original content to this environment. We need to look at it now because this technology will grow much faster than cable did.” To that end Twentieth is producing two “mobisoaps,” which will have 26 one-min. “mobisodes.” It is also producing a 24 spinoff for mobile.

The revenue potential is staggering, some said. Rob Tercek, mForma exec. vp, said ring tones brought in over $3.5 billion worldwide: “In America alone it was a $282 million business. And this is a fairly infant medium.”

Al Gore was wrong when he said we should give every child a PC, said conference keynoter and Cingular Wireless Vp Jim Ryan: “We should give everyone a cellphone because that is the way we will be interacting in real time in the near future.” Although standards remain a significant challenge, Ryan believes that MMS will be available in early 2005, which will spur even greater consumer usage. Sony’s Arrietta is equally bullish: “On mobile, we look at ways we're going to program it. The first thing I look at is ring tones, but you will also soon be able to have full length movies in your pocket which you will then cradle sync or beam to your television. The phone will be the main entertainment portal in your home and all along the way you're getting interactive brands.”