How Southeast Asian OTT Platforms Are Acquiring Content in 2026

Two days ago, at the APOS conference in Bali, Viu CEO Janice Lee and iQIYI International president Yang Xianghua stood on the same stage and announced something the region hasn’t seen before: a combined subscription bundle, billed together but consumed separately, launching across Indonesia, Thailand, the Philippines, and Malaysia in the second half of 2026. Yang called it iQIYI’s first cross-regional streaming alliance. It’s also the clearest data point yet on where Southeast Asian content acquisition strategy is actually heading.

Here’s what that bundle tells distributors that a hundred trade headlines couldn’t: platforms in this region have stopped trying to out-content each other library-for-library. They’re pooling complementary catalogs — Viu’s Korean and Chinese dramas alongside iQIYI’s premium Chinese and local originals — and competing on bundled value instead. That’s a fundamentally different acquisition logic than the one most international distributors are still pitching against.

If you’re a broadcaster or distribution executive trying to sell into this region, the platform you’re pitching matters less than understanding what that specific platform actually needs right now. Six platforms — Netflix, Viu, Vidio, iQIYI, and WeTV — control more than 85% of total viewing share across the region. But “control 85% of viewing share” disguises just how differently each of those five companies builds its slate.

Why Southeast Asia Is Six Markets, Not One

Indonesia alone has more than 200 million mobile internet users spread across an archipelago of distinct languages and cultures. Thailand has its own entertainment industry strong enough to generate sustained domestic demand for Thai-language series. The Philippines skews younger and mobile-first, with a clear preference for short-form video. Treat these as one acquisition strategy and you’ll miss what each market actually wants.

So what does that mean for a distributor sitting on a finished series? It means the question isn’t “which platforms are buying in Southeast Asia.” It’s “which platform, in which specific country, with which specific content gap.” Netflix leads regionally with 12.8 million subscribers across Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore, and Thailand — driven heavily by global franchises and Korean tentpoles. But Vidio remains Indonesia’s category leader by subscribers and viewership, second only to Netflix in the country, built almost entirely on local sports and Indonesian originals. Those are two completely different acquisition mandates operating in the same geography.

The region’s freemium tilt compounds the fragmentation. Unlike North America or Western Europe, where premium SVOD dominates, Southeast Asian consumers have a high tolerance for ad-supported content and a documented low willingness to pay for subscriptions. That’s not a temporary phase — it’s a structural market characteristic that platforms like Viu and WeTV have built their entire acquisition economics around.

How Each Major Platform Actually Acquires Content

Generic pitches fail in this region because the five leading platforms run fundamentally different acquisition playbooks. Here’s the breakdown that should shape your pitch deck.

Netflix leads on subscriber count and total viewing hours across the region, anchored by global franchises, Korean tentpoles, and a growing slate of local acquisitions specifically in Indonesia and Thailand. Their model favors premium, high-production-value content with cross-border travelability — they’re not the first call for hyper-local genre content, but they’re the platform with the deepest pockets for premium local originals that can also travel internationally.

Viu, controlled by Hong Kong’s PCCW with France’s Canal+ as a major shareholder, ranks second regionally with 9.9 million subscribers. Viu built its position on Korean and Chinese drama licensing combined with Southeast Asian productions and an aggressive push into Viu Originals and Viu Shorts micro-dramas. They’ve expanded rapidly in Indonesia and Thailand specifically through local original programming — meaning Viu is actively hunting for Southeast Asian co-production partners, not just licensing finished Korean content.

Vidio only operates in Indonesia, but within that single market it’s neck-and-neck with Netflix in viewership and revenue share. Backed by Sinar Mas, one of Indonesia’s largest conglomerates, Vidio’s acquisition strategy leans heavily on live sports — Liga 1, FIFA youth tournaments — paired with a deepening slate of Indonesian-language originals. If your content isn’t local-language and isn’t sports, Vidio is a harder sell than the regional players. If it is, Vidio moves fast and pays competitively within its single-market focus.

iQIYI International has built its Southeast Asia presence through premium Chinese content, local originals, anime, and variety programming, with Thailand and Indonesia as its strongest growth markets. iQiyi’s Thailand co-managing director told Nikkei Asia that Southeast Asia ranks among the company’s most important markets outside mainland China — a signal that iQIYI is acquiring with long-term regional commitment, not opportunistic licensing.

WeTV, Tencent-owned, runs a freemium model similar to Viu’s, leaning on interactive content formats and value-added features designed to build loyal fan communities rather than compete purely on catalog breadth. WeTV and Viu both price subscriptions 30–50% below international platforms like Netflix — meaning their acquisition economics are built around volume and engagement metrics, not premium per-title licensing fees.

The Viu-iQIYI Bundle and What It Signals for Distributors

The Viu-iQIYI announcement isn’t an isolated deal. It’s a pattern. And the pattern tells you something important about where acquisition leverage is moving.

Under the new arrangement, both services will be billed together but consumed separately — sold directly through the Viu and iQIYI International websites. The pooled offering combines Viu’s Korean-led catalogue with iQIYI’s Chinese and local-language slate, launching across Indonesia, Thailand, the Philippines, and Malaysia in the second half of 2026. It follows Viu’s own prior bundle with HBO Max in Southeast Asia and Disney+’s recent tie-up with CJ ENM’s TVing in Japan.

“It’s a great pleasure to announce the partnership with iQIYI, so as to make the best, most appealing Asian content in the coming year,” Lee said during the APOS session. Yang framed it as complementary strength-pooling rather than competitive consolidation — and that framing matters for distributors. These platforms aren’t merging acquisition budgets. They’re each continuing to build distinct catalogs while solving the customer-acquisition problem through bundling instead of price competition.

What this means practically: the era of platforms trying to be everything to every Southeast Asian viewer is ending. Bundling lets Viu stay focused on Korean-Chinese drama plus SEA originals, while iQIYI keeps its strength in premium Chinese content and anime — without either platform diluting its acquisition identity to chase the other’s audience. For distributors, that’s actually good news. It means each platform’s content gaps are becoming more clearly defined, not less. A K-drama-adjacent SEA original has an obvious home. A Chinese variety format has another. The bundling trend rewards distributors who understand exactly which catalog gap they’re filling, not generalist pitches aimed at “Southeast Asia” as an undifferentiated market.

Local Content Mandates: Where the Real Leverage Sits

Korean dramas still account for 35% of total regional viewing hours — that’s not changing soon. But the more interesting acquisition story in 2026 is what’s happening underneath that number.

In Indonesia and Thailand, 44–46% of users engage with domestic content. That’s not a niche audience segment — it’s close to half the addressable viewership in the region’s two largest markets. Multiple local Indonesian originals ranked among the most-watched titles of the quarter on Vidio in recent reporting, a clear signal that domestic storytelling is driving real commercial acquisition decisions, not just servicing a cultural-preservation mandate.

Thai series are gaining cross-border traction now too — moving beyond domestic consumption into regional pickup by platforms outside Thailand. Cross-border patterns are also showing up between Malaysia and Indonesia specifically in horror and religious drama genres, suggesting that certain content categories travel within Southeast Asia even when they don’t travel internationally.

Here’s the leverage point most international distributors miss: licensing alone increasingly isn’t enough to secure premium placement. Amazon Prime Video’s 2022 localization push into Southeast Asia involved hiring dedicated regional teams and announcing original content slates specifically from Indonesia and Thailand — not just acquiring finished product from those markets. Platforms aren’t just buying local content anymore. They’re co-producing it, embedding themselves in the development process to ensure the content matches what their specific audience actually watches. Distributors who can offer co-production structures — not just finished IP for license — are increasingly the ones getting platform attention in this region.

Freemium vs. Premium: Why the Business Model Dictates the Deal

Pricing strategy in Southeast Asia isn’t a marketing decision — it’s an acquisition decision that determines what kind of content deal a platform can actually offer.

Viu and WeTV both operate on a freemium model: free, ad-supported access with paid tiers for ad-free viewing, exclusive content, or extra features. That model lets them scale subscriber numbers rapidly, but it also means their per-title acquisition economics are built around engagement and ad inventory value, not premium licensing fees. If you’re negotiating with a freemium platform expecting premium-SVOD-style minimum guarantees, you’re negotiating against the platform’s actual business model — and that mismatch kills deals before they start.

Netflix and Disney+ run the inverse model — premium subscription with periodic price adjustments to match regional willingness-to-pay. Both have introduced lower subscription fees specifically in Southeast Asia to address price sensitivity, while maintaining a premium content acquisition posture that can support stronger minimum guarantees on exclusive content. Disney+ Hotstar remains one of the more affordable SVOD options regionally while still operating a premium-tier acquisition strategy.

Advertising is projected to account for the majority of online video revenue across most of the region outside the premium tier — meaning the freemium players aren’t a secondary market to be serviced after the premium deal closes. For a meaningful share of Southeast Asian content acquisition activity, freemium platforms are the primary market, not the overflow option. Structure your deal expectations accordingly, and you’ll close faster with the platforms actually positioned to say yes.

How to Pitch the Right Platform for Your Content

Here’s the practical framework that follows from everything above. Before you build a single pitch deck for Southeast Asia, answer four questions.

What’s your content’s primary territory fit? A Thai-language series with strong local cultural specificity has a different best-fit platform than a pan-Asian Korean-style romance. Vidio is Indonesia-only and won’t take content without a clear domestic angle. Viu and iQIYI are actively building Southeast Asian original slates specifically to feed their Korean-and-Chinese-adjacent audiences — meaning SEA content with K-drama or C-drama stylistic DNA has a clearer path there than purely local-flavor content.

Does it travel cross-border within the region, or is it single-market? Horror and religious drama are showing demonstrated cross-border pickup between Malaysia and Indonesia specifically. If your content fits that pattern, you have a multi-territory pitch. If it’s hyper-local Filipino comedy, your realistic buyer pool narrows to platforms with strong Philippines-specific acquisition teams.

Is this a licensing conversation or a co-production conversation? Finished IP gets you into the licensing queue. A development-stage project with flexibility to incorporate platform input gets you into the co-production conversation — which is where Viu, iQIYI, and Amazon have all shown the strongest recent appetite, given their localization initiatives over the past several years.

Does the platform’s business model match your deal expectations? A freemium platform negotiating engagement-based terms isn’t lowballing you — it’s operating its actual economics. A premium platform offering a strong minimum guarantee reflects its different revenue model. Pitching the wrong deal structure to the right platform still kills the deal.

How Vitrina Helps Distributors Navigate Southeast Asian Acquisition

The Southeast Asian streaming landscape changes fast — bundling announcements, localization pushes, and shifting genre appetites can all reshape which platform is the right buyer within a single quarter. Static research doesn’t keep pace with that.

Vitrina’s platform maps 360,000+ companies across the global entertainment supply chain, including the acquisitions and commissioning teams at every major Southeast Asian OTT platform. For a distributor trying to identify the right buyer for a specific title or co-production opportunity, that’s the difference between cold outreach and informed targeting.

Through VIQI, Vitrina’s vertical AI assistant, distributors can ask precise questions: which SEA platforms are actively commissioning Thai-language drama right now? Who are the actual decision-makers on Viu’s co-production team following the iQIYI bundle announcement? Which platforms have acquired comparable genre content in the last six months? VIQI draws on Vitrina’s verified supply-chain dataset to return specific names, current roles, and deal history — not generic platform descriptions.

The Vitrina Concierge service takes that intelligence further. If you’re a broadcaster or distributor with a slate that needs placement across multiple Southeast Asian markets, Concierge identifies and approaches the specific commissioning executives at each platform whose current mandates match your content — replacing generic submission queues with direct, qualified introductions.

Conclusion

For broadcasters and distributors, the practical implication is straightforward but easy to ignore under deadline pressure. A pan-regional pitch deck built around “Southeast Asia” as a single market will underperform a series of targeted pitches built around what Vidio actually needs in Indonesia, what Viu is co-producing in Thailand, and what iQIYI is commissioning ahead of its bundle launch.

The platforms moving fastest on local originals and cross-border genre patterns are also the ones setting the acquisition pace for everyone else in the region. Distributors who match their pitch to the specific platform’s mandate — licensing versus co-production, freemium versus premium, single-market versus regional — will close deals while competitors are still pitching a generic regional package nobody asked for.

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)

Which platforms dominate content acquisition in Southeast Asia?

Six platforms — Netflix, Viu, Vidio, iQIYI, and WeTV — together capture more than 85% of total viewing share across Southeast Asia’s key markets of Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore, and Thailand. Netflix leads on subscriber count with 12.8 million subscribers, driven by global franchises and Korean tentpoles. Viu ranks second regionally with 9.9 million subscribers. Vidio is Indonesia’s local market leader, second only to Netflix in that single country. Each platform runs a distinct acquisition strategy rather than competing on identical criteria.

What is the Viu-iQIYI streaming bundle announced in June 2026?

Viu and iQIYI International announced a combined subscription bundle at the APOS conference in Bali in June 2026, launching across Indonesia, Thailand, the Philippines, and Malaysia in the second half of 2026. The bundle pools Viu’s Korean and Chinese drama catalogue, Southeast Asian productions, and Viu Shorts micro-dramas with iQIYI’s premium Chinese content, local originals, anime, and variety programming. Both services remain billed together but consumed separately. It marks iQIYI International’s first cross-regional streaming alliance, following Viu’s earlier bundle with HBO Max in the region.

Do Southeast Asian platforms prefer licensing or co-production deals?

Increasingly, co-production. Platforms including Viu, iQIYI, and Amazon Prime Video have all built dedicated localization initiatives involving hiring regional development teams and co-producing original content slates from markets like Indonesia and Thailand, rather than purely licensing finished IP. This shift gives platforms more control over content that matches local audience preferences. Distributors who can offer co-production structures, not just finished content for license, are seeing stronger platform engagement than those pitching completed projects cold.

How important is local content versus international content in Southeast Asia?

Local content is commercially significant, not a niche category. In Indonesia and Thailand, 44–46% of users engage with domestic content, and multiple local Indonesian originals have ranked among the most-watched titles of the quarter on platforms like Vidio. Korean content still accounts for 35% of total regional viewing hours and remains the single largest content category. Cross-border travel within the region is also emerging — Thai series are gaining traction beyond domestic audiences, and horror and religious drama are showing cross-border pickup between Malaysia and Indonesia specifically.

What is the difference between freemium and premium OTT platforms in Southeast Asia?

Freemium platforms like Viu and WeTV offer free, ad-supported access with optional paid tiers for ad-free viewing or exclusive content, pricing subscriptions 30–50% below international platforms like Netflix. Premium platforms like Netflix and Disney+ run subscription-first models with periodic regional price adjustments to address price sensitivity. The business model directly shapes acquisition economics — freemium platforms negotiate around engagement and ad inventory value, while premium platforms can support stronger minimum guarantees on exclusive content. Distributors should match their deal expectations to the platform’s actual revenue model.

Why is Indonesia considered the most important single market in Southeast Asian streaming?

Indonesia has more than 200 million mobile internet users and represents the region’s largest and most contested single market. Vidio, backed by Indonesian conglomerate Sinar Mas, is the country’s largest VOD service by viewership, built on live sports rights including Liga 1 and a deepening slate of local originals — and remains neck-and-neck with Netflix and Disney+ within the country. Both global platforms and Chinese-owned regional players have made Indonesia a priority market for localization investment, given its scale and the demonstrated commercial strength of domestic content.

Which content genres travel best across Southeast Asian markets?

Korean drama remains the strongest cross-border performer, accounting for 35% of total regional viewing hours across both premium and freemium platforms. Within the region itself, horror and religious drama have shown specific cross-border traction between Malaysia and Indonesia. Thai series are increasingly gaining audiences beyond Thailand’s domestic market. Sports content, while less exportable across borders, drives significant single-market subscriber acquisition, particularly for Vidio in Indonesia. Distributors should evaluate genre fit against demonstrated regional travel patterns rather than assuming universal appeal.

How does Vitrina help distributors identify the right SEA platform for their content?

Vitrina’s platform maps 360,000+ companies across the global entertainment supply chain, including acquisitions and commissioning teams at every major Southeast Asian OTT platform. VIQI, Vitrina’s vertical AI assistant, answers specific questions about which platforms are actively commissioning in a given genre or territory, surfacing current decision-makers and recent deal history. Vitrina Concierge extends that intelligence into direct outreach, connecting distributors with the specific commissioning executives whose current mandates match their content — replacing generic submissions with targeted introductions.