 | |
| Company type | Subsidiary |
|---|---|
| Industry | Home entertainment |
| Founded | 2003; 23 years ago (2003) |
| Defunct | 2021; 5 years ago (2021) |
| Fate | Liquidation |
| Headquarters | Sydney, NSW,AUS |
Area served | Australia New Zealand |
Key people | Stephen Langsford (founder) |
| Products | OnlineDVD andBlu-ray Disc rental,internet streaming |
| Parent | Karma Media Holdings |
| Website | Quickflix.com.au |
Quickflix was an Australian company that provided onlineDVD andBlu-ray Discrental by mail as well asinternet streaming of movies and television shows via onlinepay-per-view or subscription.
Initially established as an online disc rental company in 2003, Quickflix launched online movie downloads in 2006, and their streaming service in 2011.[1] By June 2014 the company had more than 182,000 subscribers.[2][3] Although the first major streaming service to operate in Australia, Quickflix quickly lost ground to much larger competitorNetflix entering the market in 2015, among others.[4] The company enteredvoluntary administration in early 2016, and was relaunched later that year under new owners.[5] After several more years of trading, Quickflix waswound up in September 2021.[6]
The company provided a monthlyflat-fee service for the rental of DVD and Blu-ray titles. Subscribers created an ordered list, referred to as their Quickflix Queue, of titles to rent.[7] The discs are then delivered individually viaAustralia Post; the individual postage-paid envelopes would typically arrive within four days to most areas of Australia. Subscribers can keep the rented title for as long as desired, without any formal due dates and without accruing any late fees. However, there was a limit on the number of titles (a maximum of two, previously this was determined by subscription level) that each subscriber could have on loan simultaneously. To receive a new title, subscribers must mail a previously received disc back in the reply-paid envelope provided. Upon receipt of the disc, Quickflix would then ship the next available disc in the subscriber's queue (subscribers could also pre-notify the return of a disc online, thereby receiving the disc sooner).[7]
Quickflix streaming was available over a range of smart TVs, games consoles, Blu-ray players, desktops, laptops, mobiles, tablets and other devices. There were two tiers of content subscribers could access: a set library of movies (consisting of mostly older titles) that was included with a customer's subscription, and premium content (usually newer movies) that required an additional fee per title to watch. Consumers could also pay to watch individual premium titles without a streaming subscription. Prior to its relaunch in 2016, Quickflix also offered television series to stream, but after the relaunch their streaming library consisted exclusively of movies.
Throughout the years, Quickflix had made deals withDisney,NBC Universal,BBC Worldwide andLionsgate to stream their content.[8][9]HBO's 2012 investment in the company also gave Quickflix access to HBO's back catalogue of shows until 2015.[1][10]
Customers could combine a streaming and disc rental subscription for a discount.[11]
Quickflix was founded by Bill Keech, Sam McDonagh and Stephen Langsford, who were shortly afterwards joined by Simon Hodge. Langsford and Hodge would continue as long serving executives and directors following the company's launch in 2003 inPerth, Western Australia.[12] The company would attract prominent business figuresBruce Gordon,Lachlan Murdoch andDomenic Carosa as investors.[10]
Quickflix was listed on theAustralian Securities Exchange in 2005,[13] but was delisted in 2017.[14] In December 2005, Quickflix acquired rival company HomeScreen, a move that doubled the Quickflix customer base.[15] In 2006, Quickflix launched movie downloads, competing againstBigPond Movies.[1] In April 2011, Quickflix announced the dispatch of their 10 millionth DVD, a copy ofShrek Forever After.[16]
In July 2011, BigPond Movies revealed that they would no longer continue their DVD-by-mail service, selling their library of 50,000 titles to Quickflix.[17][18] In that same month Quickflix announced that they would launch a subscription video streaming service initially on a selection ofSony's internet-connected devices, with the service eventually launching on 27 October 2011.[19] Quickflix streaming became available onPCs andMacintosh computers, and on thePlayStation 3 later that same year. In January 2012, Quickflix announced a deal that would bring their service toSamsung TVs, mobiles and tablets,[20] withMicrosoft signing a deal to make Quickflix streaming available onXbox 360 consoles later that year. The Quickflix app was installed as a stock app on a number ofWindows Phone devices for a time.[21]
In March 2012 Quickflix launched their streaming service in New Zealand.[22] That same month, US premium TV network HBO, a division of global media giantTime Warner, invested $10 million in Quickflix for a strategic stake.[1][23] However the following year saw the company face a temporary cash flow crisis that saw four of its six board members quit and its CEO depart.[10]
By 2014 Quickflix was established as Australia's leading streaming service, and had boasted more than 182,000 subscribers as of June of that year.[2] However, facing stagnating subscriber numbers,[1] on 21 July 2014 it was announced thatNine Entertainment had acquired all of HBO's shares in Quickflix, thus becoming Quickflix's major investor.[24] Nine paid $1 million for HBO's shares, just 10% of what HBO paid.[1] By the following year a number of streaming competitors had launched in Australia: Netflix,Presto andStan, the latter a joint venture between Quickflix major shareholder Nine andFairfax Media. With their entry, Quickflix began to haemorrhage subscribers.[4]
On 26 April 2016, Quickflix Australia announced that the company had enteredvoluntary administration, appointingFerrier Hodgson to oversee the process. Quickflix blamed the company's largest shareholder, Nine Entertainment for their predicament, as they had refused to restructure the shares it had acquired from HBO, which would have enabled Quickflix to raise additional capital for investing in content and marketing to enable it to compete in an increasingly crowded market.[25][1] According to the company, Nine would only accept the restructure in exchange for a multi-million dollar payment in cash, which the company did not have, or have Quickflix transfer its customers to Stan, which the company refused.[1] Nine also blocked a prospective deal with rival Presto,[1] and the company was also forced to abort the planned acquisition of an unnamed Chinese film and media company.[26] It was reported that in the five years to 2015 the company had posted net losses of more than $40 million in total.[10]
On 4 October 2016, U.S.-based Karma Media Holdings acquired Quickflix.[5] Quickflix was relaunched in December 2016, offering a revamped streaming subscription which includes rental of up to four premium titles a month in addition to the set streaming library, and a renewed focus on new release movies.[27][11] However in the subsequent years Quickflix's streaming library saw increasingly limited updates,[28] and the company's focus largely returned to offering disc rental by mail to a niche consumer base.[29]
In May 2021 awinding up application byEnergyAustralia was lodged against the company.[30] Quickflix was wound upby court order in September 2021.[6]
