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Dec. 26 (NBD) -- Youku, Alibaba's video streaming platform, has signed a licensing deal with NBC Universal and Sony Pictures Television, racing to seize more premium resources to attract paying subscribers.

According to the agreements, Youku's subscribers will have access to more foreign films, including released ones like Spiderman series, Fast & Furious series, Despicable Me series and Blade Runner as well as upcoming movies like Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle.

The new deal brought Youku closer to its overseas partners. In 2015, Youku struck an agreement with Disney as an exclusive internet marketing partner of the latter, and in 2016, Youku won the exclusive licesing deal in mainland China with Oriental DreamWorks. 

As providing licensed contents has become a major way to scramble for paying users, China's top video streaming platforms are all seeking for collaboration with overseas video producers.

IQiyi, Baidu's online video unit, bought the Internet broadcasting rights of existing 800 films and new movies from Paramount Pictures in July 2015, three months before it purchased the three-year exclusive copyright for all new programs of BBC Earth to be made in three year from then. 

Moreover, the platform signed a content licensing agreement with Netflix in April this year, in the purpose of attracting fans of American drama.

Youku's another rival Tencent Video also partnered with Paramount Pictures in November 2014. One year later, Tencent's video service teamed up with HBO, making the platform the exclusive online provider of HBO series such as Game of Thrones, one of the most watched TV shows among Tencent Video's VIPs.

Last year, Tencent cooperated with Fox's National Geographic Channel and Japan's NHK to fill in the gaps in documentary.

To grab more market shares in the paid video market, China's top video platforms attach great importance to the content diversity to satisfy users' varying tastes.

In recent two years, users tend to pay more for the videos. In 2017, over 40 percent of internet video subscribers have paid for the videos they have watched, according to data from 2017 China Internet Audio-Visual Development Research Report. 

The report also said that the paying subscribers who spend over 40 yuan (6.1 U.S. dollars) per month account for 26 percent of the total users this year, a figure increasing from 20.2 percent in 2016.

Subscribers are willing to pay for quality contents, which created great potential in the paid video market. The increasing number of such users could fundamentally change the profit models of video platforms which relied on the revenues gained from advertisement in the past.

Given China's economic growth, the change of consumers' concepts as well as the enhanced consciousness of copyright protection, the paid subscription will be the mainstream for users and the quality contents will largely lead to the renewal of their subscription.

Email: zhanglingxiao@nbd.com.cn