Amazon Prime, the global streaming subscription service with 200 million members worldwide and accessible in over 100 countries, Thursday, launched its streaming service ‘Prime Video’ in Nigeria .
According to the company, Nigerians, for the first time, will be able to subscribe to Prime Video using the local currency. This means the audience will be able to pay a subscription fee of N2300 monthly which is equivalent to $5 and would not require a VPN to access the content.
It further stated that Prime Video will be launching their first local original movie, Gangs of Lagos directed by Jade Osiberu, produced by Kemi ‘Lala’ Akindoju, and co-produced by Akin Omotoso, later this year.
In line with its comprehensive goal, the streaming platform intends to work with the best local talent, find and share unique Nigerian stories from different genres and ensure products created for customers are high quality and hyper-local.
It also aims to promote diversity by providing a broad catalogue of content inclusive of Nollywood, Hollywood, and Bollywood content as well as Japanese anime. On the mission to achieve their goal of inclusivity.
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The Steaming services stated its support for content creation in Nigeria and offered partners solid and long-term relationships with Amazon Prime videos which will showcase their content.
Ayanna Lonian, Director of content acquisition and head of worldwide major studio licensing for Amazon Prime Video service said “Efforts to invest in the acquisition of local content have been underway for months. Coming out of the fourth quarter of last year, we have been through a number of several ground-breaking agreements with filmmakers and Nollywood studios here in Nigeria. We have closed exclusive theatrical outlet agreements with Anthill Studios and Evoke Studios”.
Amazon Prime Video launched back in 2006 in the United States as Amazon Unbox before detaching to become Amazon Prime video in 2016.
“We made the conscious decision to focus on Nigeria because this is where storytelling lives and comes from. It’s the moment for film and Tv to do what Nigerian music is doing globally,” said Ned Mitchell, head of originals for Africa and the Middle East.
Nangi Mba-Uzoukwu, Head of Nigerian originals for Prime Video said it is important to reach every single audience. “We aren’t in any particular niche. We really want to be diverse and reach a variety of audiences.”
