Amazon Prime Video inks licensing deal with Nigeria's Anthill Studios

Streaming service giant, Amazon Prime Video, has signed a multi-year licensing agreement with Nigerian production company, Anthill Studios.

The deal, announced on Friday, January 7, 2022, gives Prime exclusive global distribution rights to the studio's catalogue of films after their theatrical runs.

The studio boasts some of Nollywood's most high profile films of the past few years including Prophetess, Day of Destiny, and Progressive Tailors' Club that were released last year.

"We want to showcase the very best of Nollywood and authentic African stories to our customers and this groundbreaking deal helps us to achieve that goal," said Ayanna Lonian, Prime's Head of Worldwide Major Studio Licensing Strategy.

At N131 million total gross, Anthill's Prophetess was last year's third highest grossing Nollywood film [Instagram/@niyi_akinmolayan] Pulse Nigeria

Expressing his excitement about the deal, Anthill founder and creative director, Niyi Akinmolayan, said it's an opportunity to do a lot of great things, especially with the bigger audience pool that Prime provides.

He noted that films produced by the studio will start streaming on Amazon Prime Video 'a couple of weeks' after the end of their cinema runs in Nigeria.

"The beauty of this is that we can expand the range of stories we want to tell and explore other genre," he said in an Instagram post.

Prime inked a similar deal with another Nigerian production company, Inkblot Studios, less than a month ago in December.

After making the streamer's first public appearance in Nigeria at last November's Africa International Film Festival (AFRIFF), Prime executives announced a serious commitment to Nigerian creators.

"Our ambition for Nigerian creators is beyond Nigeria. It's to take the beautiful culture of Nigeria and expose it to as many people as possible," Ukonwa Kuzi-Orizu Ojo, Chief Marketing Officer for Prime Video and Amazon Studios, told Pulse in a private chat.

Amazon has reported it has over 200 million paying Prime subscribers worldwide.