Yandex’s Yango presented a beta version of the media service for the Middle East and North Africa

Yango presented a beta version of the Yango Spark application for MENA countries (Middle East and North Africa) – this is a single platform for films, TV series, music and games with support for the Yasmina voice assistant. The full launch, according to Kommersant, is planned before the end of the year. Russian media services of Yandex (MOEX: YNDX) will have the opportunity to promote original content through Yango Spark. The promotion and content of the service may be complicated by its Russian origin and competition with Spotify and Netflix.

Kommersant discovered a beta version of the Yango Spark media service on GooglePlay, available in the MENA region. The service has sections with films and TV series, music and mini-games. The legal entity of Yango Spark is Funtech Loyalty Card Services LLC, registered next door to Yango’s Dubai office. The full launch of the application will occur before the end of the year, believes Kommersant’s interlocutor in the media market. Yango confirmed that the service is in test mode.

The application currently works in the UAE, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Egypt, Bahrain, Oman and Kuwait, and supports English and Arabic, according to the platform’s official page. Yango’s international division website lists 18 countries, including the UAE, Israel, Finland and Norway. A monthly subscription costs 69.99 EGP (208 RUR). The application integrates the Arabic-language voice assistant “Yasmina,” which the Yango team introduced in October. Kommersant’s source clarified that a subscription to Yango Spark will be similar to Yandex Plus (access to all company services).

In October, it was announced that Yango was opening its first international operating office in Dubai. It is located in the free economic zone Dubai Internet City. From the operating office, Yango will manage divisions in other countries, the company said in a statement. Among them is the Yango taxi ordering and delivery service Yango Delivery.

In November 2022, it became known about plans to divide Yandex’s business into Russian and international. RBC reported that the founder of LUKOIL Vagit Alekperov, the owner of Kismet Capital Group (KCG) Ivan Tavrin and a structure associated with the leader of the “New People” faction Alexei Nechaev are vying for a share in the Russian one. In October, the company received permission from the Foreign Investment Control Commission for internal restructuring, and on December 25, Reuters reported that completion of the process had been postponed until 2024.

According to the consulting company Mordor Intelligence, the media and entertainment market in the Middle East now stands at $39 billion a year. By 2028, the figure will reach $61.2 billion with an average annual growth rate of 9.41%. In thirteen Arab countries in 2023 there will be only 15 million subscribers to online video services, notes Dmitry Kolesov, director of the department of new technologies at J’son and Partners Consulting: “We can say that the market is just emerging, but for new participants there is a big problem – high cultural barriers to entry “

The entry of Yango Spark into MENA is logical; Yandex Taxi is developing along the same path, says Mr. Kolesov. It is premature to assess the share that a media service can occupy in the market, the expert believes: “For example, Netflix, with 13 million subscribers, can occupy a larger share. But how many live users are these?” For Kinopoisk (part of the Russian Yandex), the release of Yango Spark in MENA will provide an opportunity to promote original content to international markets, the expert believes. The company does not comment on what content is currently available on the platform and whether there are films and music from labels and artists who have stopped working with the Russian Yandex.

The main question is how the service will develop in conditions when most of the media market has already been divided by Spotify, Netflix (available in the UAE with VPN) and other participants, emphasizes Kommersant’s interlocutor close to one of the streaming platforms. These services, he explains, already have agreements with foreign copyright holders, while Yango may “have problems due to its Russian origin.”

Yulia Yurasova, Alexey Zhabin