You might have used Zoopy in the past – be it for user generated videos or to quickly catch up on current happenings, but now Zoopy is refocussing their strategy to mobile. With a new range of applications made for the major mobile platforms, users can quickly access news and entertainment videos on their device of choice. Zoopy is also halting the use of user generated videos, and is instead focussing on self produced Zoopy TV videos. Zoopy runs on a “the world in 90 seconds (or less)” slogan, so they are ideal for quick consumption on mobile devices.
In South Africa we have a mobile penetration rate of about 98%. Over 20 million South Africans own web-capable phones, which serve as their primary point of contact with the internet. For most of these users, who don‘t have access to TV, DVDs or other gadgets, it‘s also their only access to the entertainment world at large. Their phones deliver an interconnected choice of games, social networks and video. And as feature phones expire and smartphones replace them, mobile entertainment is fast becoming the industry‘s leading growth area.
With SA’s focus on mobile broadband, this is perhaps the ideal time for Zoopy to use this new business model. Mobile broadband is in for a lot of competition, with Cell C getting the ball rolling with their recent Speedstick offerings – but we are still waiting for Vodacom and MTN to match that offer. The ideal is of course that these lowering costs also reach normal data bundles, not only dongle focussed packages. If a user uses a data bundle, mobile video becomes a lot more affordable – and I see a lot of new phone contracts are starting to add small data bundles in the deal. Video traffic from mobile phones increased by 60% globally in 2010. A recent Nielsen report showed that 20.3 million people watched mobile video in the US in the first quarter of 2010, spending an average of three and a half hours each.
Zoopy also did a complete redesign of its site, and the results are impressive! I have to say the new theme is a big improvement on the aging blue design of the past. Here at Bandwidthblog we do love infographics – and Zoopy got the guys from Cow Africa in to make a great one – just click the image below to be taken to the full version:
