Quickflix may have lost the first battle when a slurry of video streaming services arrived in Australia in early 2015, but the war is far from over.
And even though Quickflix went into administration in April 2016, the first casualty turned out to be Seven-Foxtel joint venture Presto, which was closed down at the start of this year.
![Erik Pence, the new owner of Quickflix in Australia, at the Mojo facility in Los Angeles.](/web/20170126092026im_/http://www.canberratimes.com.au/content/dam/images/g/t/x/s/s/2/image.related.articleLeadwide.620x349.gtxt5c.png/1485410841673.jpg)
And now, after six months in administration, Quickflix is now being resurrected by US-based privately owned Karma Media Holdings, which is majority owned by a man called Erik Pence.
Even though it is now privately owned by Americans, Quickflix still has offices in Sydney and still sends DVDs out to Australian customers, who are surprisingly attached to the little silver discs.
![Stan chief executive Mike Sneesby.](/web/20170126092026im_/http://www.canberratimes.com.au/content/dam/images/g/i/a/z/x/x/image.related.articleLeadwide.620x349.gtxt5c.png/1485410841673.jpg)
About half Quickflix's annual revenue could still be attributed to DVD-only customers in late 2015, former chief executive Stephen Langsford told Fairfax Media.
"I wish management and the new owners all the best. At least it is somewhat of an outcome for customers and staff going forward," Mr Langsford said this week.
Mr Pence knew about Quickflix because his business Mojo Makers did some digitisation work when Quickflix was one of the first streaming services in Australia.
In October his holding company paid $1.3 million [and covered employee costs] for a company that had a market capitalisation of $2.2 million when its shares were suspended on August 31, 2015. Now Mr Pence wants to expand its operations.
![Netflix started as a DVD rental company and has become one of the biggest streaming companies in the world.](/web/20170126092026im_/http://www.canberratimes.com.au/content/dam/images/g/t/3/3/x/m/image.related.articleLeadwide.620x349.gtxt5c.png/1485410841673.jpg)
The DVDs are still popular because not everyone has access to the right kind of internet connection and data allowance, he believes.
"We believe the DVD business in Australia still has a lot of legs and is very strong," Mr Pence says. "DVD is familiar and known and many people prefer it."
Quickflix has just increased its warehouse space in Sydney to hold more discs and will soon start offering parcels of five discs at a time because customers found it was taking too long to send and receive single discs.
"Australia Post has been very limiting in how they are servicing and how many days a week they are servicing," Mr Pence explained.
He is also introducing "one-way rentals" where customers can keep the DVD for an extra $5, which he agrees is the same as buying a DVD.
Mr Pence says the new Quickflix will not be competing against Stan and Netflix – he is targeting people who want to stream a single movie, but dislike iTunes because it locks them into Apple's ecosystem. Quickflix is currently charging about $1 less than iTunes for the same movie.
"Our plan is becoming the platform-agnostic home for the newest movies coming from the movie studios ... before they are available on Stan and Netflix at all," he told Fairfax Media.
Mr Pence says he has spent 20 years in the movie industry, first in DVD distribution and now digitising movies for electronic distribution. He hopes these relationships will get him access to movies before anyone else.
"My relationship with studios and content providers is pretty much the space we live in. All the major studios are clients of mine. We are part of Hollywood."
He sees Stan and Netflix as the place where people binge watch an entire series, with Netflix now "becoming a HBO" by creating its own shows.
Quickflix had about 140,000 subscribers in early 2015 and is now marketing directly to that database.
Netflix does not release its subscriber numbers, but Stan had 600,000 active subscriptions in late 2016 and saw a record rate of sign ups over the summer break, according to sources. (Stan is co-owned by Nine Entertainment and Fairfax Media, publisher of The Age and The Sydney Morning Herald).
Another new player in the streaming space is OzFlix, which launched this Australia Day, about six months later than originally planned. It is the brainchild of local film industry veterans Ron Brown and Alan Finney and is dedicated solely to Australian movies.
OzFlix will offer about 250 titles, according to Brown, but aims to make every Australian movie available to stream. Titles are rented for $3.79 a week for back-catalogue films, $6.79 for newer titles and $5.79 for a curated bundle of five films. iTunes and Quickflix only rent for 48 hours.
Meanwhile, there are signs that reports of the death of DVD appear to have been greatly exaggerated. According to the Australian Home Entertainment Distributors Association, Australians bought $805.5 million worth of DVDs and Blu-ray discs in 2016. That was a decline of 11 per cent from the previous year.
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