Grupo Televisa's stake in TelevisaUnivision, Inc.
At the end of January 2022, Televisa completed its 4.8 billion-dollar merger agreement with Univision, the leader of primetime TV among the Spanish-speaking audience in the United States. The result is TelevisaUnivision, of which the Mexican group holds a share of approximately 45 percent. The move started a new chapter in the history of both companies. Decades ago, the owners of Televisa had to sell their operations in the U.S. because of limits to the foreign ownership of media companies. Those businesses turned into what was then known as Univision. Despite the separation, the relationship between the two companies remained symbiotic. Between 2014 and 2020, Univision paid on average 345 million dollars in royalties to Televisa annually – the value surpassed 417 million dollars in 2021. By joining forces with the New Yorker company, Televisa aims at an ambitious target: to create the largest Spanish-speaking subscription video-on-demand (SVOD) service in the world.The long way to streaming expansion
The debut of Televisa in the video streaming market took place in 2016 with Blim, a platform that has not gone very far. At the end of 2021, it held less than a two-percent market share in the SVOD segment in Mexico. Still, the group is no stranger to creating and selling its own content – hence the international fandom of its telenovelas. In 2020, despite the COVID-19 pandemic, Televisa managed to produce over 74 thousand hours of TV programming sold to non-Mexican broadcasters. Meanwhile, Blim heavily relies on local content. In 2021, over 74 percent of the feature films available on the streaming service were Mexican. Now with a foot in the U.S. and another in Mexico, TelevisaUnivision may be able to finally stand tall amidst the biggest players in the global SVOD industry. The world is watching.
