Sabay and Smart Axiata’s flagship partnership kicks off with Soyo and StreamOn collaboration on Sabay’s 10th anniversary.

Phnom Penh, 27th October 2017: Earlier this October, Cambodia’s No.1 digital media and entertainment company Sabay Digital Plus Co. Ltd. (“Sabay”) entered into a strategic partnership with the country’s leading mobile operator Smart Axiata.

The first initiative under this partnership is the collaboration between Soyo, Cambodia’s first homegrown Khmer Streaming Video on Demand (“SVOD”) platform and StreamOn, Smart Axiata’s prepaid data and streaming plan. The purpose is to leverage individual strengths – Sabay’s content and Smart’s ever-expanding 4.5G Internet network – together creating a delightful mobile streaming experience with a widespread of entertainment content for its joint tech-savvy subscribers.

On the eve of Sabay’s 10-year anniversary, Soyo will be offered free for Smart subscribers for the first two months. After the trial period customers can choose from three Soyo standalone subscription offers – daily, weekly or monthly – whereby Smart customers enjoy the exclusive benefit of up to 20% discount on the standard retail prices; daily subscription costs as little as 4 cents. The monthly package includes an added benefit of advertisement-free content. All three Soyo packages come with the promise of unlimited hours of excitement and exclusive content.

Moreover, from November, Smart’s StreamOn 2 (weekly package) and StreamOn 8 (monthly package) subscribers will enjoy full free access to Soyo as part of the bundle.

Sabay historically has inspired original content creators through platforms like E-Novel, Hear-my-Song and short film competitions. “We know Cambodians want original quality Khmer content. There is a dearth of original content but we are also aware that there are many young creative people. With Soyo our ambition is to create a strong platform to showcase their content, and the collaboration with Smart definitely boosts the delivery network” says Chy Sila, Sabay’s founder and CEO.

The Short Films Season 1 is now exclusively available on Soyo, while the Season 2 challenge was announced this month. All this will culminate into a short film award later this year. Apart from these exclusive titles, the lineup for the year includes “Srotun Mun Sne”, “Mun Sneh Lekha”, “Pou Keng Kang” and the series version of the Khmer best seller “ONE MISSION” is set to debut early next year.

“When we started in 2007, the digital landscape was nascent, it was a curiosity driven space. Everything that we did was on the basis of our ground-level understanding, love for digital tech and pre-empting what the market would possibly be in the next decade. On our 10th anniversary we can say it has worked well for us and Cambodia.” Sila added.

This latest announcement by Smart builds on its increasing involvement in digital entertainment partnerships and innovative offerings as it strives to strengthen its data leadership and transform into a digital lifestyle brand.

“Marrying high quality local content with high quality network delivery was always one of the main drivers of our partnership agreement with Sabay. We are thrilled to see it taking shape so quickly with Soyo. We are confident that Cambodians, Smart StreamOn subscribers in particular, will enjoy the mobile streaming experience while supporting young filmmakers to showcase their capabilities,” said Thomas Hundt, Smart Axiata CEO.