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Amazon (AMZN) Expands in Australia With Back to the Rafters

Zacks Equity Research
Updated

Amazon AMZN announced that it will launch its first scripted Australian Amazon Original series — Back to the Rafters — on Amazon Prime Video.

The filming of the series, which will be produced by Seven Studios, will begin next year. Once completed, the series will stream on Prime Video in Australia, and in more than 200 countries and territories.

Back to the Rafters is the next chapter of Australia’s most popular drama series, Packed to the Rafters.

The lead writer of Back to the Rafters is creator Bevan Lee and executive producer is Julie McGauran. The Rafter family emphasizes on family bonds like honesty, love and laughter. At its center are parents Dave (Erik Thomson) and Julie (Rebecca Gibney).

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Amazon is looking to gain traction among Australian online video audience with Australia-based original content. This is likely to enhance the viewer base of the upcoming series.

We believe that the series is likely to encourage Prime membership in Australia.

Amazon.com, Inc. Price and Consensus

Amazon.com, Inc. Price and Consensus
Amazon.com, Inc. Price and Consensus

Australia Holds Promise

The company’s latest move is a testament to its strong focus on expanding presence in Australia. Notably, the e-commerce giant is aware of the country’s immense opportunities.

With the original Australian content, the company is well poised to reap benefits from the video streaming market of the country, which, per a report from Statista, is expected to generate revenues of $119 million in 2019,and reach $146 million by 2023 at a CAGR of 5.3% between 2019 and 2023.

Further, user penetration in this particular space is anticipated to reach 21.2% by 2023.

This will create growth opportunities for its e-commerce business in Australia. All these positives are likely to aid the company’s top line.

Continuous Expansion of Original Content

We note that this upcoming series in Australia will be another addition to Amazon’s original content and comedy series portfolio.

The company also announced other series in Australia this year that include LOL: Last One Laughing, The Test: A New Era for Australia’s Team and a series of 10 Amazon Original stand-up specials.

Further, its original Japanese series — Documental — starring megastar comic Hitoshi Matsumoto is another example of this strategy. Additionally, Amazon recently premiered the second season of Comicstaan, which is a show centered on stand-up comedians of India.

Apart from these original comedy series, the company revealed plans for its first Brazilian Amazon Original series, All or Nothing: Brazilian National Football Team, last month.

All these above-mentioned facts indicate that the company is spending aggressively on expanding content portfolio.

We believe that these measures are likely to strengthen its footprint in the global online streaming space. Notably, the market is witnessing intensifying competition due to increasing efforts of Netflix NFLX, Disney DIS, Hulu and Apple AAPL.

Among these, Netflix rules the roster with the highest number of subscribers driven by its expanding original content portfolio.

However, Amazon’s expanding content portfolio, increasing content investment and comparatively lower subscription price make it a strong competitor of Netflix. Also, these factors are likely to aid Amazon’s competitive position in the market.

Zacks Rank

At present, Amazon has a Zacks Rank #3 (Hold). You can see the complete list of today’s Zacks #1 Rank (Strong Buy) stocks here.

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Click to get this free report The Walt Disney Company (DIS) : Free Stock Analysis Report Netflix, Inc. (NFLX) : Free Stock Analysis Report Amazon.com, Inc. (AMZN) : Free Stock Analysis Report Apple Inc. (AAPL) : Free Stock Analysis Report To read this article on Zacks.com click here. Zacks Investment Research