BPN 1594: Digital entertainment market in the Netherlands improves

The Dutch entertainment association (NVPI) has published figures on the entertainment industry in the Netherlands. It concludes that consumption of music, television series, movies and games was higher than ever in 2011. However, as the average price for digital products is lower than those for physical CDs and DVDs, the total turnover was lower. Expectations for 2012 are positive, but the fight against piracy is still needed.

Music. Physical music products turned over 180.2 million euro, which is 10,3 per cent less than in 2011. Downloads scored 25 million euro. Downloads and streaming make up for 15 per cent of the total turnover of the music products sector; this is low in comparison to the US with 50 per cent and worldwide 32 per cent.

Audio-visual content. The physical market for products as movies and television series slowed down with 8 per cent. The slowdown can be blamed on the price lowering. However the digital market of video-on-demand is rising fast. In 2011 the turnover is estimated on 53 million euro, a rise from 2010, when the turnover was estimated to be 35 million euro.

Games en interactieve software. The turnover of games is estimated 28 million euro, which means a drop of 24 million euro in comparison to the year before. These games are sold through networks like Xbox Live, Playstation Network and PC portals like Steam. New is the sale of games for tablets, smartphones and social networks. No concrete figures of these are available. It is observed that these games are lower in price than the console games, but their consumption is larger.

NVPI expects that the turnover of digital distribution will increase, but will not be able to compensate the sales of the physical products.

Figures for 2011

Source: Dutch language press release by the NVPI on 23 February 2012