Subscription Economy News - Week of 5/6/2019

Every week, we bring you the top stories and analyses from the global Subscription Economy. 

‘Nation as a service’ is the ultimate goal of for digitized governments
Excerpts from an article by Mar Masson Maack  in TNW. 

Kaspar Korjus, the Founding Managing Director of Estonia’s e-Residency program, shared his futuristic vision on how to get nation states to digitize with attendees of TNW2019. The private sector has set the pace for technological transformation, and Korjus thinks it’s time for nation states to catch up.

“I believe nations are becoming independent from their own physical land, citizens, services, and revenue to start serving humanity like never before,” Korjus said.

The first out of the 10 phases for tech-driven nation states that Korjus foresees is activating ‘a digital mode.’ This basically means the governments can recognize you online — because digital IDs are the cornerstone of modern states.

Building on top of that, nation states enter the next phase: opening their ‘app store,’ bringing a selection of services to their citizens, like filing for benefits and taxes online. Korjus says this bit can be tricky in the beginning. It took Estonia 5 years to get the public on board after the app store was launched in 2002.

From there, they can move on to ‘empowering the data network.’ Estonia currently has a system of decentralized data centers that ensure security as well as accountability. Every citizen can access logs of which government bodies and companies view their personal information. In phase four, government services become invisible and provide everyone with the benefits they’re entitled to automatically.

Countries have started on most of the latter phases Korjus has sketched out, but they’re still a long way from achieving them completely. But when they do, Korjus believes we’ll see the rise of ‘nation as a service‘ where nation states will compete to provide their users with the best service possible.

Read the full article in TNW.

Interview Of The Week: Eric Chaniot
Excerpts from an interview with Michelin’s Chief Digital Officer & SVP Eric Chaniot by Jennifer L. Schenker in The Innovator. 

Q : A 130-year-old French tire manufacturer may not seem like a likely pioneer but Michelin began its digital transformation early, launching tires-as-a-service or on-line navigation services in 2000. Where is Michelin on its digital journey ?

EC : This is just the beginning of our digital transformation. We don’t see ourselves as a tire company, we see ourselves as one of the leaders in mobility and if we want to continue to be one of the leaders in mobility we have to be much better at everything digital.

Q: What does Michelin mean when it says it wants to be a “mobility leader”?

EC: Everything we do — even on digital — is connected with the purpose of Michelin: to enable people and goods to travel in a better and more sustainable way.

Q: Michelin is moving beyond connected tires into new types of services. What kinds of new services are you adding?

EC: We are looking at selling tires on a usage basis: people pay based on mileage. We already do that for trucks and we sell airplane tires based on the number of landings. We also have some contracts with military organizations. We maintain the tires for them.

Read the full article in The Innovator. 

New York Times Company Continues to Add Online Subscribers as Digital Advertising Grows 
Excerpts from an article by Edmund Lee in The New York Times.

The New York Times Company on Wednesday reported first-quarter results that were better than expected, as gains in digital advertising and subscriptions outpaced the inexorable decline of its once-mighty print business.

The total number of paid subscriptions, including digital and print, topped 4.5 million, a high. More than 3.5 million people pay for the publisher’s online products, with the company adding 223,000 customers for its news, crossword and cooking apps during the quarter, a 29 percent increase over last year.

The company is seeing positive results at a time when newspapers nationwide have been suffering. Last week, the bulk of The Times-Picayune news staff in New Orleans was fired after the paper was acquired from Advance Publications by a rival publication in Louisiana, The Advocate. Gannett, the publisher of USA Today and 100 other newspapers, has laid off reporters across the country and is fending off a hostile takeover bid.

Read the full article in The New York Times.

AMC Theatres’ Monthly Movie Service Passes 785,000 Subscribers
Excerpts from an article by Jeremy Fuster in The Wrap

AMC’s A-List — which offers members the chance to see three movies per week for $19.95 per month, with no blackout dates and premium formats like IMAX included at no extra charge — is expected to hit 1 million subscribers well ahead of the company’s June 2020 estimate, AMC CEO Adam Aron said.

The exhibitor also expects additional growth in subscribers for the rest of the year, given the glut of highly-anticipated films like “The Lion King,” and “Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker.”

CEO Adam Aron said that subscribers frequently brought family and friends with them to theaters and bought tickets at standard price, further increasing the program’s profitability.

“Based on the average frequency of our A-List members, their associated full-price bring-along guest attendance, their food and beverage spend and the price increases in the first quarter, we believe the A-List program resulted in incremental profitability in the first quarter of 2019 compared to our estimated results if the program had not existed.”

“We estimate a profit from the program of about $3 per member. That’s about $2.3 million in profits based on current subscriber counts,” said Aron.

Read the full article in The Wrap

For more Subscription Economy resources and events, head to www.subscribed.com

 

Recommended for you

ZEOs Investing in Women this International Women’s Day
Strategic Insights from Zuora’s Subscribed Institute Executive Breakfast in London
How to create personalized subscriptions using Zephr