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Telemundo is launching a streaming brand within Peacock that will cater to younger generations of Hispanic audiences who are based in the U.S., the company said on Thursday.
The content hub, called Tplus, will include a slew of new scripted and unscripted shows, including a six-part docuseries about the Colombian artist J Balvin from Exile Content Studio and NBC News Studios, an anthology docuseries about top stories in Latino pop culture and a show about three middle-aged Latino couples in L.A. in the midst of “emotional crossroads in their marriages,” according to a logline shared by the network.
Premium tier subscribers to NBCUniversal‘s Peacock, which starts at $4.99 a month for the ad-supported version and $9.99 a month for ad-free, will be able to watch new shows created for the Tplus brand, in addition to the other content already available to Peacock subscribers.
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The idea to create a streaming content hub catered toward Hispanic audiences in the U.S. came as part of the launch of the NBCUniversal Telemundo Hispanic Streaming division last August, which was primarily tasked with making Peacock the “prime destination for Hispanic content in the U.S.,” according to Romina Rosado, the evp and general manager of Hispanic Streaming at NBCUniversal Telemundo Enterprises.
Speaking with The Hollywood Reporter, Rosado said Tplus is meant to resonate with U.S.-based Hispanic viewers who tend to skew younger and are, therefore, digitally native and may be seeking out a wide spectrum of Spanish and English content. At the same time, having Tplus-branded shows on Peacock will allow other non-Hispanic or Spanish-speaking viewers to reach that new content.
“What we’re seeing over the last couple of years, in particular accelerated by the pandemic, when all of us had a lot more time and started watching shows in languages that we probably don’t speak, that it has opened up a wealth of content and we think that Tplus has a role to play in that space,” Rosado said.
Much like how the 2020 Olympics were meant to serve as a launching pad for Peacock, Rosado said she expects the upcoming FIFA Men’s World Cup to serve as a “big unveil” for Tplus that drives new subscribers to Peacock, which has struggled to gain paying subscribers since its launch in 2020.
Aside from its plans for the Tplus hub, NBCUniversal Telemundo Enterprises has inked a multiyear first-look deal with Bianca Quesada’s ARCUS Studios for English and Spanish scripted and unscripted content. (Quesada was on the development team for Vida and is the co-executive producer of Off the Rims.) Local Telemundo-owned news channels will also be launching streaming channels later this year to serve bilingual audiences in New York, Miami, Los Angeles and Puerto Rico, though the company has not yet determined which platform those channels will be housed on.
“We have a real opportunity to change the way that Hispanic content is viewed and to make it a lot more reflective of what the audience actually looks like and the experience of a second- or third-generation Hispanic in this country who may not even have been to the home country of their parents and who’s not really seeing himself or herself reflected in any of the content that they have right now,” Rosado said.
A previous version of this story misidentified Bianca Quesada as the creator of Vida. She worked on the development team for the show.
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