The title of Vivek Kut’s opening speech at APOS 2026 uses the word “reset”. He has a more precise word in mind.
“It hasn’t really reset,” said Couto, CEO and executive director of Media Partners Asia, which is organizing the annual summit in Bali from June 16 to 18. “In fact, it’s being redefined. The entire industry is being redefined in terms of possibilities, in terms of new revenue streams and, frankly, in terms of the cost structures that we have to adopt.”
This distinction—incremental disruption versus structural transformation—is the animating tension of the APOS agenda. Now in its 20th year as Asia Pacific’s premier gathering of media, the conference brought together executives from JioStar, Warner Bros. Discovery, Crunchyroll, iQIYI, Viu, TVING, Prime Video, Netflix, Disney and YouTube to ask questions about what business is becoming – something that can no longer be explained by the vocabulary of the industry that built it.
Coote says that the forces driving this change are multiple and simultaneous. AI has moved from conference panels to real-world operations. Streaming stopped being a land grab and started generating real profits. Sports has grown into a pillar of the entertainment economy. And microdramas, short, vertical videos built on the principles of gamified entertainment, have moved from novelty to true consumption category.
“Microdramas are no longer a novelty,” Couto says. “This is a real consumption category and we have the data to prove it.”
Dramabox and ReelShort, two profitable peers in the microdrama space, have a combined annual revenue of nearly $1.5 billion, and most of their users are based in the United States, said Kuto. Speaking at a session titled “Microdrama, Megaeconomics” on the first day, ReelShort CEO Joey Jia said the company has been aggressively expanding into Thailand through its partnership with AIS, and is now also eyeing Japan and South Korea. India is emerging as a new frontier: Kout said the Microdrama platform has delivered about $300 million in deals within India in the past six months, with an expected annual run rate of $800 million to $900 million.
Whether that trajectory is maintained is another question. “The jury is subscribed,” Coote said. “But how do we make it sustainable? What is the lifetime value of these users?” As for ad monetization, he was more cautious, saying, “Honestly, it’s hard to tell.”
Uncertainty about profitability hasn’t dampened investor appetite. With China’s top micro-drama players and India’s top micro-drama players seeking fresh funding, Couto sees the category as a magnet for new investment, but it is overshadowed by the immediate ambitions of TikTok and Meta, both of which he acknowledges are entering the format with “intent and speed”. In our second day’s exclusive panel, “Inside the Microdrama Pipeline,” we hear from RJ RisingJoy’s Cassandra Yang and Bamboo Network’s Dabin Chung about what the production stack looks like from the inside.
The proliferation of microdramas sits within a broader vertical video shift that has drawn in publishers from the New York Times and CNN to Disney and Netflix. But Couto is careful to distinguish between the format’s mass-consumer appeal and premium storytelling. He noted that Asian platforms appear to be licensing content from the U.S. operations of Chinese microdrama companies rather than catalogs originating from China, which he suggests is a sign of quality differences that matter to regional audiences.
As for sports, APOS 2026 will feature ICC CEO Sanjog Gupta, La Liga President Javier Tebas, and JioStar Head of Sports and Live Experience Ishan Chatterjee, with a session titled “Sports as a Platform: Fandom, AI, and Commerce Layers.” Coote points to data points from the latest ICC cricket cycle that illustrate how the geography of the sport is changing. For the first time, meaningful demand emerged far outside India. Japan ranked in the top three markets. Indonesia came in 4th place. 5th place goes to Thailand.
“How do you monetize it?” Koto asks. “How do you develop fandom? And how do you develop new revenue streams, like merchandising, ticket sales, and working with brands and advertisers, rather than just relying on these rights cycles and streaming platforms?”
The question reflects broader pressure on rights holders to reduce reliance on broadcast and streaming platforms as the sole revenue stream and create a diverse fandom economy like the one pioneered by F1. In this session with Copa90’s Tom Thirlwall, we examine what that model looks like in practice. Simon Robinson, President of Global Experiences and Worldwide Studio Operations at Warner Bros. Discovery, brings the experience economy into the conversation in a fireside session titled “Beyond the Screen: The Business of Living the Story.”
If sports represent opportunities for engagement, AI represents efficiency and the reinvention of play. Coote sees the core problem with AI not as deploying tools (“everyone is doing it,” he says) but as embedded intelligence. It’s the difference between connecting AI to legacy systems and building an organization where decisions, data, and teams are built around AI. This paper shapes the “Intelligent Enterprise” keynote from TWG Global’s Thomas Tull, and informs a session featuring Google’s Jon Zepp and Andy Serkis, Kling AI’s Melody Hou, and an expert panel discussion on GenAI across the content pipeline with JioStar’s Stephan Bugaj and FBRC.ai’s Todd Terrazas.
Localization is one area where the impact is already measurable. When Netflix first expanded globally, localization across dozens of languages was a significant cost burden. Its costs have come down significantly, and the Microdrama platform was the first to implement AI-powered localization at scale. Streaming companies and broadcasters are now following suit.
The long-term AI theme, Couto argues, is about freeing up capital for content. He cited the example of ABS-CBN International, which leveraged AI not as a creative tool but as a technology and infrastructure vehicle, reducing operational costs by 50 to 60 percent and directing the savings toward content investments. He makes a similar point about Australia’s Foxtel. Following the company’s acquisition of the broadcaster, Foxtel merged its engineering stack with DAZN and is now focusing its spending almost entirely on content.
“Netflix has been so successful, in part, because they have the freedom to invest and spend on content,” Couto said. “That’s what everyone should do.”
For global investors trying to read Asia, Couto identifies two persistent misconceptions that are slowly being corrected. The first is that local content is undervalued, not only as a driver of engagement but also as a transactional engine. The expansion of Korean content is well documented. The reach of Chinese content in the region has expanded dramatically over the past two years. Therefore, iQIYI and WeTV are focusing not only on streaming platforms but also on studio and content licensing capabilities with APOS.
The second misconception is the pace of change. Coote points to Stage, a Blume Ventures-backed streaming platform focused on Indian dialects. Stage has grown to 3 million direct subscribers who pay for local language and niche content. Its growth has attracted attention from India’s top streamers. “Don’t mess with Asia,” he says. “Going into Asia was something you could do in the ’90s and 2000s. It’s very different now.”
This year’s APOS will have its own expert panel on Thai content, with director Banjong Pisantakul and TrueVisions NOW’s Dee Dee Hortaweechai among those looking into why Thai stories are so prevalent. Vidio, a local streaming platform currently generating revenue with distinct sessions held in the Philippines and Indonesia, and which Kuto estimates is Indonesia’s leading local streaming platform in terms of revenue, serves as a case study on how local content can increase subscription share in a competitive market.
A wave of Korean content continues to reshape the region’s streaming map. Couto said the impact of Korean content on Max’s growth across Southeast Asia and Taiwan has been transformative, driving both viewership and subscription numbers in these markets. WBD APAC Chairman James Gibbons will join Netflix’s Minyoung Kim, Prime Video’s Gaurav Gandhi and Disney’s Tony Zamekowski in a panel discussion on the first day of the conference titled “Asia’s Streaming Advantage: Growth, Profitability, and the Future.”
Investor Lens will have its own dedicated space on the first day in a panel titled “Capital in the Age of AI: Where Investors are Betting on Sports, Streaming, and Stories” featuring Blume Ventures, Elysian Park Ventures, Asia Partners, and VI Group.
When you ask Couto which of the trends reshaping Asia’s media landscape will be most important in five years, the answer is clear. “It’s definitely going to be AI,” he says. “That’s just the beginning.” But he’s precise about what that means. AI will not replace storytelling or IP, but it will determine which companies have the structural freedom to compete in both. He believes that companies that find ways to embed intelligence into their operations, reduce their traditional cost base, and redirect resources to creative investments will be the ones that will survive the next phase of redefining media in Asia.
APOS 2026 will be held from June 16th to 18th at The Mulia, Nusa Dua, Bali. Pre-conference activities on June 16th include the AVIA Policy Roundtable, AVIA Piracy Roundtable, and an invitation-only CEO Forum, with the main conference program beginning on June 17th.
