A huge move in the Spanish-language media network took place this month when U.S. Univision joined with Mexico’s Grupo Televisa to form a third company — TelevisaUnivision — that will produce content for both and create a new streaming channel.
“I think, overall, the whole merger, if you will, has to be considered in light of both historical, technological and changing consumer preferences,” said Melita Garza, associate professor of journalism, in an interview with Southern California’s KPCC.
She said that while one of the biggest money-makers for Spanish television has been telenovela — Spanish soap operas — that may be changing with younger audiences. Coupling that with the major viewing shift to streaming services means change is certainly looming.
“I was speaking just this morning with one young, Mexican-American, first-generation college graduate, and she said her parents who are immigrants from Mexico no longer even watch the broadcast stations. They only watch Netflix. So these are Spanish-language-dominant people,” Garza said. “That's not an intensive survey, but I think we're also seeing that technology is fueling this creation of different kinds of programming that clearly wouldn’t have seen the light of day under the old network system.”
Listen to the full interview on KPCC.