It’s been a rocky Q3 for U.S. linear networks. Total revenue fell 9%, partly due to COVID creating lower distribution and ad revenue. But AMC Networks is still managing to finish out the year strong with an anticipated 5.5 million streaming subscribers across all its linear offerings, including the new AMC+.
AMC’s SVOD services, Acorn TV, Shudder, Sundance Now and UMC, are expected to accumulate more than 4 million subscribers by the end of 2020. AMC+ is expected to hit 1 million paying subscribers in its first year.
“As a reminder, this is a goal that we previously didn’t anticipate reaching until the end of 2022. So, we are fully two years ahead of plan and are far exceeding our earlier expectations,” said AMC Networks CEO Josh Sapan.
AMC is also far ahead of internal projections in terms of revenue and is expected to generate $200 million in streaming revenue for 2020, marking 100% growth year over year.
“So, in just 12 months, we’ve also doubled the amount of revenue for our company coming from the streaming business. And we do think it’s important to underscore that for a company of our size, the impact of 5 million subs today and 10 million, 15 million or 20 million subs in the future is very, very significant in terms of transforming the composition of our top line revenues,” Sapan said.
AMC+ is a new service that brings together content from across AMC Networks’ brands, including AMC, Shudder, Sundance Now, and IFC Films Unlimited, along with a linear network of AMC programming. It’s already available on Apple and Amazon Prime Video Channels. The service costs $8.99/month after a 7 day free trial.