10 media pros, beneath the cloak of anonymity, are expecting 2022’s industry-shaking occasions

New 12 months prediction items are a journalism same old. However as a substitute of giving my very own projections, I requested 10 media executives, the promise of anonymity, to present me their best possible guesses on what is going to occur in 2022.

The foundations have been easy: The prediction may well be the rest associated with the media and leisure trade, however it needed to be important and could not be evident.

Here is what they informed me.

I’m going to revisit the predictions presently subsequent 12 months to look how they grew to become out, after which ballot 10 new executives for his or her 2023 predictions.

One govt stated Roku will purchase Lionsgate’s movie and TV manufacturing studio.

Roku has been beefing up its unique content material within the Roku Channel, purchasing Quibi’s content material library and “This Previous Space” in 2021. Founder and CEO Anthony Wooden informed CNBC in June he is devoting maximum of his time charting out a content material technique for the corporate.

“This rings a bell in my memory such a lot of Netflix in its early days,” media analyst Michael Nathanson informed CNBC previous this 12 months. “I used to interview [Netflix Co-CEO] Ted Sarandos at meetings 10 years in the past, and he’d say, ‘Oh, we are pleased with only one or two unique presentations.’ In the meantime, they would be laddering up into higher content material.”

Lionsgate has already signaled to the funding international it plans to both spin off or promote Starz, the top class streaming carrier and cable community it owns. That would depart the remainder of the corporate — Lionsgate’s movie and TV manufacturing studio — primed to discover a purchaser as neatly.

Whilst conventional content material firms corresponding to Comcast’s NBCUniversal, ViacomCBS, Netflix and Disney are all taking a look so as to add extra content material to their streaming products and services, Roku is a wild-card purchaser that has the marketplace valuation — just about $30 billion — to make a transfer.

Nonetheless, Roku stocks have fallen by means of greater than 50% since attaining an all-time top in past due July. Purchasing Lionsgate’s studio would possibly get traders to take its content material ambitions extra critically.

It hasn’t even been two years since Bob Chapek took over as Disney’s CEO. However one govt informed CNBC there are already inside wagers at Disney about Iger returning.

Iger, 70, again and again prolonged his contract after making plans to retire in 2015, 2016 and 2018 ahead of impulsively stepping down in 2020. He is nonetheless Disney’s govt chairman till the tip of the 12 months.

It is unclear if Iger needs to go back. He is already running on a 2nd e book, in line with The Hollywood Reporter, after publishing one in 2019.

However Disney stocks have stumbled this 12 months, down just about 20% 12 months thus far. Iger owns a large number of the ones stocks. The board and Iger would possibly get stressed if Disney+ enlargement stagnates and the corporate continues to have turf tensions between executives.

Two votes for this one.

“I like Shari [Redstone], however ViacomCBS isn’t lengthy for this international because it stands nowadays,” stated one in all two media executives who predicted 2022 would be the 12 months ViacomCBS ceases to exist as an impartial corporate.

Comcast has already held initial talks with Redstone, the controlling shareholder and nonexecutive chair of the corporate, previous this 12 months to talk about quite a few tactics to paintings in combination. A merger of NBCUniversal and ViacomCBS could be messy from a regulatory perspective, most probably requiring a divestiture of both NBC or CBS and their related native associates.

Over the last two years, Redstone has internally pondered different possible choices, corresponding to purchasing Lionsgate’s Starz and merging with Sony Footage Leisure, in line with other folks acquainted with the topic. A care for Warner Bros. Discovery, if that merger closes, is smart. However up to now, ViacomCBS’s messaging to Wall Side road has been that it is content material to transport ahead as is.

It used to be again in 2015 when billionaire media multi-millionaire John Malone coined the time period “loose radicals” to outline pure-play content material firms that shouldn’t have the dimensions to compete for top-notch motion pictures and TV presentations towards media behemoths corresponding to Netflix, Disney, Amazon and Apple.

A few of the ones loose radicals have already consolidated. Viacom and CBS have merged. WarnerMedia and Discovery agreed to merge. Amazon is looking ahead to regulatory approval to shop for MGM Studios.

However others, corresponding to Lionsgate, AMC Networks and Fox, live on. This govt predicts none will probably be solo after 2022, both promoting to greater competition or merging with each and every different.

Vox’s option to merge with Staff 9 units itself as the following logical virtual media candidate to head public after BuzzFeed. It in order that occurs that Staff 9 has already established a SPAC that may be utilized by the corporate to head public, at the side of merging with some other virtual media participant to realize extra scale.

If SPACs stay tainted from an funding viewpoint, this govt stated Vox may additionally pursue an ordinary IPO. The timing may well be very similar to BuzzFeed’s this 12 months — a statement of an IPO in past due June and a public release on the finish of 2022, the chief stated.

Apple’s streaming video ambitions were muted, given the corporate’s huge dimension. “Ted Lasso” is successful for Apple TV+, however the carrier has operated in large part at the outer edge of the streaming wars.

That is prone to exchange, stated this govt, in 2022, and it is going to be pushed by means of the purchase of a content material studio. A recent staff of people that can create hit presentations would possibly not simply make Apple a extra severe participant churning out unique content material. It is going to additionally give Apple a library of TV and film presentations it may be offering to shoppers. That is one thing Apple does not personal but, however it is most probably crucial to severe long-term streaming ambitions.

Some other pillar of the streaming wars that has a tendency to get omitted is the arena of loose advertising-supported products and services, highlighted by means of Fox’s Tubi, ViacomCBS’s Pluto TV, Amazon’s IMDb TV, and Sinclair Broadcast Staff’s STIRR. Good TV working techniques additionally be offering loose streaming networks, corresponding to Samsung TV Plus and the Roku Channel.

This govt predicted free-streaming TV may have surging enlargement in 2022 however can even consolidate. Too many of those products and services are providing necessarily the similar factor — a bundled providing of loose networks with a large number of previous motion pictures and TV presentations and syndicated programming.

A rollup of a number of of those products and services is most probably in 2022, in line with Government No. 10.

(Disclosure: Comcast owns NBCUniversal, the guardian corporate of CNBC. Comcast and NBC Sports activities are traders in FanDuel)

WATCH: Streaming wars winner will probably be one with probably the most mass hits, says ViacomCBS govt