Astro’s group chief executive, Rohana Rozhan, makes her MIP Mastermind keynote debut in Cannes in April with a few clear messages. First among these is her mission – underpinned by significant tech upgrades – to make the Astro experience second to none.

Astro group chief executive, Rohana Rozhan, takes to the MIP TV stage for the first time this year with a strong message and a handful of clear priorities. The first is to reclaim Astro’s position as Malaysia’s premium entertainment service provider, pulling together all its assets into a comprehensive ecosystem and offering a holistic experience for consumers, starting inside the home. “We are dominant in the home, especially in urban areas, where we have about 90% of the main screen in the living room. Now we need to make that experience second to none,” she says.

Significant tech upgrades – including cloud-based PVR for seamless viewing across devices – are being rolled out to underpin this drive, culminating at the end of the year with an Alexa-type “box that can talk”. Astro’s turbo-charged tech journey kicks off with the World Cup in Russia in June, beginning with its 1.3 million sports subscribers and then reaching out to everyone in Malaysia within spitting distance of a screen. The activity around the World Cup is Astro’s biggest content initiative in its 22-year history. “It’s going to be unlike anything anyone has ever seen,” Rozhan promises. “We’re using the World Cup to drive numbers and to reinforce our position across all devices,” she says, adding: “The World Cup is a huge differentiator for us”.

Another priority is to deepen engagement with the Malay community, which makes up 70% of Malaysia’s population of 32 million. The plan for the Malay space is to “build an ecosystem and pipeline starting from ideation and talent across our media assets, she says. To this end, Astro inked a joint venture last year with Malaysian publisher, Grup Majalah Karangkraf, to create and monetise vernacular content across all platforms, including digital and on-air. Astro paid RM100 million/US$25 million for its 51% stake in the venture, Karangkraf Digital 360.

Rozhan talks about redefining the customer persona “from cradle to grave, and providing for each and every one of them”. Content and services that don’t move the needle will be culled and replaced with IP that drives deep engagement. Malay vernacular content is a “fundamental differentiator” and “buys us an ability to lead”, she says.

A key content priority continues to be “Nusantara” programming created and developed with partners in ASEAN countries. “We can’t do it alone,” Rozhan says, talking about content pipelines and win-win collaborations that pool resources across borders.

Where does all this leave international channel brands and content rights holders? “We are all for things that are signature and that clearly differentiate us,” Rozhan says, talking about the value of access to a full suite of rights across all devices/platforms and a likely end to exclusive channel carriage. “We have to over-deliver on our promise for premium. It’s an extremely crowded market,” she says. “We cannot,” she insists, “afford to be caught on the back foot.”

​Published in Issue One of ContentAsia's inprint+online 2018 (4 April 2018)