Research, page-1459

Generally speaking, I don't think TV2U thought strategically of Vonetize beyond Brazil. They needed desperately a partner in Brazil to fill the VOD gap in their offering and that prompted the current negotiations. Vonetize has a Brazilian/Portuguese VOD offering, they don't have one in Indonesian/Bahasa.

In Indonesia the general situation is tricky. On one hand, Indonesia imports annually about US$200 million worth from Israel, but they tend to be products strategic to the country's development and ones that cannot be found elsewhere. The president of Indosat Ooreedoo summed up the situation pretty well by stating that if “There are vendors from other countries producing similar products” they will deal with them not with an Israeli company.

On the other, Indonesia is a Muslim country, has no diplomatic relations with Israel, and hosted a conference a couple of years ago where the boycott of Israeli products was discussed. The anti-Israel sentiment is far deeper among the population than it is among some politicians and some top brass in business. A factor that cannot be ignored.

I doubt TV2U thought of Vonetize for Indonesia and, as I mentioned earlier, Smartfren has a deal with Genflix that is better suited locally and which TV2U cannot ignore. However, if for whatever reason TV2U wanted to add Vonetize to their offer, they may either have to hide Vonetize altogether (i.e. name not appear in any document or stream) or use a US subsidiary as the supplier. What will determine the outcome of the implementation is how the people involved in the project in Indonesia will perceive the situation if Vonetize was to be included in the project. I doubt there will be a blow-back on the project overall.