Following its debut in the Balkans and Baltics later this year, the OTT service Sweet.TV will be available in a total of 19 markets across the region, says the group’s CEO Mykhailo Khyzhniak.

Sweet.TV Group CEO Mykhailo Khyzhniak describes the company as “a media tech company, from the technology rather than from the content side.”

Mykhailo Khyzhniak

And, he says, it operates a “cutting edge, subscription-based” OTT service that combines linear TV and VoD in one application. Entirely developed in-house, according to Khyzhniak, it’s a service that already counts among its partners major content players such as Disney, Universal, Warner Bros Discovery, Sony Pictures, CME, United Media, AMC and Viacom. Moreover, its footprint is spreading fast across Central and Eastern Europe (CEE).

Currently available in seven countries – Poland, Hungary, Romania, Czech Republic, Bulgaria, Slovakia and Ukraine – Sweet.TV has already been tried by over 17 million users. And it’s set to launch in 12 additional countries in the Balkans and Baltics later this year. Its two-year plan is to be a pan-European OTT TV platform offering its subscribers local TV channels in each country.

Key to the technology is the advanced app and its “multipurpose” quality, according to Khyzhniak, who explains that it employs dynamic ad insertion (DAI) and FAST, AVoD and pay-per-view technologies.

A big plus of Sweet.TV, according to Khyzhniak, is the stability of app performance and content streaming, along with the sustainability of the platform and user experience, “which is something that we do really professionally.”

He also stresses that Sweet.TV is multiplatform and can be received via set-top boxes, mobile, the web, games consoles and smart TVs. Furthermore, it has developed a strong recommendation system for both TV channels and VoD.

In terms of its content offering, Sweet.TV provides viewers with local and national, entertainment, movie and kids channels, along with premieres and a VoD library that includes titles from both major studios and independents, such as New Regency, two to three months after their cinema release.

Sweet.TV can be received via set-top boxes, mobile, the web, games consoles and smart TVs

To receive Sweet.TV, users can sign up for a seven-day free trial, after which they can receive the service for a further 14 days for only €1, or the equivalent in local currency. Subsequently, they can sign up for one of three packages, with the main difference between them being the number of TV channels – from 43 up to 145 – they offer. All include Disney, Paramount and Sony premieres, along with over 1,000 top-rated movies.

Sweet.TV does not produce its own content – currently at least – instead focusing on localisation, whether via voiceover or dubbing. But the third-party content it does offer, says Khyzhniak, varies from country to country.

“Our strategy is that local approach defines everything. This means that in each country we have local TV channels, for instance TVP, TVN and Polsat in Poland; RTL and TV2 in Hungary; and Pro TV in Romania. Each country has local TV channels and we do our best to provide the biggest ratio of localised VoD content,” explains the CEO.

Sweet.TV Group traces its roots back to 2008, when it launched as an ISP in Ukraine, offering TV channels. It started developing its OTT solution in 2015 and rolled out the product in late 2018, into 2019. Its expansion into other markets started in early 2022, when it launched in Slovakia and the Czech Republic. Hungary and Poland followed later in the year, with Bulgaria and Romania following in Q2 2023.

Reflecting on important developments at Sweet.TV last year, Khyzhniak says that the company went in two main directions. The first was to scale the business and the product in the six CEE countries it expanded to beyond Ukraine. “This was the biggest challenge and accomplishment and now we will have an even bigger scale of 18 territories,” he says.

The second was “great product advancement in terms of not only FAST channels and DAI, but also new functions like in-content purchasing, where people watching ads can buy with one click what they see on the screen.”

Sweet.TV was launched in Ukraine in 2008

Sweet.TV currently has around 50 FAST channels in Ukraine, where it acquires content, does programming, playout, targeted ad insertion and ad sales. “We are in negotiations with some CEE countries,” adds Khyzhniak. “We have the technology and experience, and we are open to partnerships with local players who would like to launch this model.”

These could well be plentiful, given that FAST channels are becoming increasingly popular across the region. This is especially the case in Poland, where Warner Bros Discovery added to the growing number already available on the market by launching 15 on its Player platform earlier this year.

Significantly, Khyzhniak stresses that the FAST channel business only works when you provide local or localised content. He says it would completely fail if you, for instance, launched Ukrainian FAST channels in Bulgaria. Even English-language FAST channels would only have a 50/50 chance of success, he suggests.

Reflecting on the challenges faced by Sweet.TV, Khyzhniak says that it calls on its successful experience to date. “To put it simply, we know what to do and don’t have any struggle with development directions.” At the same time, it treats each market, and the global and local players, media groups and local telcos present in it, separately.

The biggest challenge, he adds, is to roll out the product on time and to prove the product on the market. The metrics show that this has already been achieved in the countries Sweet.TV is present in and the next challenge will be the 12 countries in the Balkans and Baltics.

Khyzhniak adds that when it comes to content consumption on Sweet.TV, local linear TV channels are at the top. “It’s very obvious for us and we believe in the TV business.” Moreover, despite what is said about the viewing share of such channels decreasing, “we see on our platform that it’s not so much decreasing as the pattern of consumption is changing. People are still willing to watch channels and shows, and when you properly give them this content they continue to watch these channels.”

Looking to the future, Khyzhniak observes that the market is already changing, with people increasingly using smart devices and moving from cable and satellite TV over to OTT services. “What we see for the next year in terms of the OTT business and OTT products,” he adds, “is that OTT will become a multifunctional player on the market.” This will be through content delivery and also becoming a strong player on the advertising front, both on FAST and via DAI on existing channels.

Khyzhniak also believes that OTT will become the “next phase” of audience measurement and a strong monetisation instrument in terms of sales. Ultimately, “OTT will become not only content delivery but also e-commerce.”