Q&A: Isaac Benbenisti & Liran Dan, Partner Communications

Partner Communications execs talk about the strategies and successes that have led Partner TV to becoming a ‘Super Aggregator’ and the fastest growing TV service in Israel.

Isaac Benbenisti, CEO

What does it mean to be a ‘super aggregator TV service provider’ and why does this model benefit consumers?

Being a super aggregator means bringing our subscribers access to all the vast content offered by global streaming services in Israel, along with dozens of leading linear channels provided with up to two weeks of catch-up ability. Partner TV is the only TV service in Israel, offering integration with YouTube, Netflix, Amazon Prime Video, Spotify and more, on 100% of its STBs. The fact that you can find all this rich content, and that it is all accessible through Partner TV without having to switch from one HDMI to the other, makes for a perfect viewing experience.

What are the key elements of a successful service that maximises both the revenue opportunity for the service provider and customer satisfaction with the service?

It is all about placing the customer\viewer in the center of everything we do, and remembering that as a service company, we are here to serve.

The way we do that, is by constantly observing and learning the ever-changing viewing habits, allowing us to always add innovative features and adjustments that make the viewing experience even better.

One interesting insight that we’ve learned recently, was that only 49% of the daily viewing time on Partner TV STBs, meaning four hours and twenty nine minutes, is spent in the linear channels, additional 29% is spent on streaming services, and an additional 22% is spent in time-shifted TV, mainly in viewing content with our Catch Up ability.

How has Partner set about growing its presence in the Israeli TV distribution market and what key demands from consumers has it been able to address?

Partner TV has been the fastest growing TV service in Israel for more than two years since launched in August 2017. This is mainly since we operated from the get-go with the understanding that the future of pay TV services is in becoming a ‘super aggregator’. Customers’ desire to have all content available in one place has given our service the competitive advantage and appeal over our competitors in Israel, who still serve content in the old-school way that forces the user to switch between separate content services and providers, instead of accessing all the content worlds through one user-friendly gate.

What new and innovative features do you have on Partner TV, for providing your subscribers an even better viewing experience?

The new interface we’ve recently introduced, includes advanced ‘global search’ capabilities, that brings search results from all the content worlds available to our customers, including linear channels, recordings, VOD content, streaming apps installed on the STB, etc. One of the things we clearly see is that the immense richness of content significantly increases viewers’ search-time, and we do everything we can for making the process simpler and easier for our customers. The new global search ability along with the voice search supporting Partner TV remote, makes for the best search interface in the market, giving us a significant competitive advantage.

Liran Dan, VP strategy and business development

Can you share some of your plans for 2020?

In order to further develop our ‘super aggregator’ strategy, we will soon be adding a cloud gaming service to the content and music services available on Partner TV. The new gaming app, will enable our customers to turn the STB into a gaming console, with access to hundreds of popular games in different genres. Customers will be able to play using their own controllers, or use new controllers provided by Partner TV, adding another dimension of fun to their viewing experience.

What is your strategy when it comes to the changes in the advertising world, resulting from the shift to OTT services?

In 2019, we have integrated advanced systems, enabling us to offer advanced Addressable TV services to advertisers, with much more accurate segmentation capabilities. We see the programmatic advertising market in the world growing impressively, and the capabilities we offer today are the most advanced in Israel. In recent months, international companies such as Samsung, H&M and others have launched advertising campaigns on Partner TV, based on our addressable TV abilities. The capabilities made available by such new innovative programmatic advertising systems, are definitely a significant market-changing development in the global advertising world.