iQIYI CEO GONG Yu: Original Content, Innovation, and Global Expansion Are Key Growth Drivers

BEIJING, April 5, 2023 /PRNewswire/ -- GONG Yu, Founder and CEO of iQIYI, shared that original content, technological innovation and global expansion are key to iQIYI's quality growth, in a keynote speech at the 10th China Internet Audio and Video Convention (CIAVC) held on Mar. 30.

Gong marked once again the company's strategic commitment to original content: "Online audio and video platform has transformed from a content distribution platform into a major provider for both content creation and distribution. Self-produced, original content is taking an increasingly larger proportion and has become a major content pillar of audio and video platforms," he said.

According to the company's letter to investors in February, iQIYI initiated its original content strategy back in 2014, and made substantial breakthroughs in 2022. In the past two years, its investment in original content reached nearly RMB20 billion. Besides, original content accounted for over 60% of the blockbuster dramas streamed in 2022 and generated more than 60% of the revenue during new release window. In 2022Q4 alone, the subscribing members' viewing hours of original content doubled on a year-on-year basis.

Gong also believes that the internet audio and video industry is becoming a new frontier for technological application. "Taking iQIYI as an example, by leveraging internet-based artificial intelligence, big data, and cloud computing technologies, we developed three supporting systems to predict and analyze business indicators, standardize the process management of film and TV production and improve the working efficiency for industry practitioners, further facilitating the industrialization of the film and TV industry.

He added that, as the algorithm-based technological advancements such as AI-Generated Content (AIGC) have now been applied to an increasing number of scenarios, content creators can now leverage AIGC to generate script, image, and audio content based on massive data harvested, which in turn translates to more possibilities empowered by smart production for the industry.

With regard to overseas business development, Gong shared that to date, users from over 190 countries and regions worldwide can watch the content on iQIYI International with an internet connection. The company has distributed over 7,000 episodes of TV series, variety shows, animated series, and documentaries, as well as over 300 films to more than 200 overseas markets. Moreover, iQIYI International App supports user interface and subtitles in 12 languages and delivers over 1,700 drama series, variety shows, animations, and more than 3,500 films.

According to the latest report released by China Internet Network Information Center(CNNIC) at 10^th CIAVC, online video has overtaken instant messaging to become the most popular internet application in China, with the user size exceeding 1 billion and utilization ratio up to 97.4%. The market value of the pan-Internet video entertainment industry has now grown to RMB 700 billion. Five major platforms, namely iQIYI, Tencent Video, Youku, Mango TV and Bilibili, now account for 89.5% of the market share.

CONTACT: iQIYI Press, [email protected]

SOURCE iQIYI