8 December 2014: Viki doubles downloads in 12 months.Online video platform Viki hit 25 million mobile app installs at the end of September – up from 13 million at the same time last year – with more than 50% of video views a month viewed on mobile and connected devices.The latest figures show that mobile video starts were up 136.19% and minutes viewed were up 125.76% in the 12 months to September 2014.Viki.com's Singapore-based director of product management, Mela Cortez, says mobile growth is not, in general, a big surprise, and that expectations are that installs will double again in the next 12 months. "As the market moves towards mobile, Viki will move with that," she says. What may have been a surprise was the fastest-growing markets – Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines and Thailand – and the high viewership of long-form content on mobile devices. The common factor across the four markets is consumption of Asian drama.Indonesia is now Viki's second biggest market, followed by Malaysia (third), Philippines (fourth), Singapore (sixth) and Thailand (seventh). The U.S. tops the list. Three of Viki's top 10 languages are Asian – Indonesia (fourth), Korean (sixth) and Thai (tenth).Cortez says habits have shifted in the past two years from mobile usage predominantly while on the go. "Now even at home people are accessing content on mobile," she adds. Mobile includes bigger-screen tablets, which could account for some of the higher usage.The 136% growth in video starts is driven by an aggressive effort to acquire top drama in key markets such as Korea, Taiwan and Japan. Viki has also improved its content discovery process, including search and recommendation, Cortez says, adding: "Minutes-viewed growth is because of the content. People are engaged and watching longer".The biggest challenge is internet speed. "We are continuously looking at ways to improve the load time," Cortez says. Ideally, videos will load within five seconds. The average load time in Asia is about 10 seconds.What's next? Wearables, Cortez says. "In the next few years, wearables are a global trend. Another one we are exploring is mobile to TV interaction. Right now, there's no link between the two, so we are looking at that." She pre- dicts a shift in in-home use of Viki and mobile when users can beam to TV sets. As she says: "If people have the option to watch on big screen..."ContentAsia Issue 6, 2014