Client
The Walt Disney Company and one of the major telecom operators in CEE with 23+ million subscribers and a nationwide retail and distribution network.
Problem
Teleсom operator wanted to strengthen customer loyalty and attract new subscribers using premium franchise content. Disney wanted broad promotional reach for Avengers: Infinity War without sacrificing control over licensing, data, or distribution.
Both sides faced structural barriers:
- Telecom loyalty systems were not designed for secure, per-user digital content licensing
Traditional promo platforms couldn’t ingest, issue, or track digital movie entitlements at national scale.
- Prepayment-heavy licensing made large content bundles risky for telecoms
Industry-standard practice required ~80% upfront payment for digital rights, which limited campaign size.
- Disney required real-time control and analytics
Disney needed visibility into each activated code, consumption behavior, and user data—something telecom systems typically couldn’t provide.
- Mass marketing rollout across thousands of offline and online channels
Telecom operator needed an engine that could handle millions of redemptions with zero manual reconciliation.
Disney and telecom both needed a massively scalable, rights-controlled, analytics-rich digital distribution layer.
Solution
The team delivered a large-scale entitlement and content distribution system integrated directly with telecom’s mobile ecosystem and billing infrastructure.
1. One million licensed movie codes with controlled, per-user activation
Disney licensed 1,000,000 digital entitlements to the telecom operator.
All issuance, redemption, and rights enforcement went through our platform's licensing engine:
- unique codes
- per-user entitlement records
- controlled activation windows
- revocation and policy enforcement
The telecom operator didn’t store or host any content files.
2. Direct integration with telecom's mobile app and subscriber wallet
The solution enabled:
- free Marvel content for eligible subscribers
- additional Disney movies purchasable through the telecom's account balances
- frictionless in-app entitlement activation
- automatic provisioning without manual account linking
The mobile app became a distribution gateway for Disney’s digital catalog.
3. Hardware-independent, carrier-grade backend
The licensing system operated across:
- 23M+ subscribers
- 100,000+ retail points (SIM activation, onboarding, POS promotions)
- all telecom digital channels (app, SMS distribution, online promos)
No change to telecom's network core or OSS/BSS was required.
4. Real-time visibility and analytics for Disney
Disney received:
- live reporting on each activation
- subscriber-level insights (email or other provided data)
- per-channel performance metrics
- full control over licensing policies
This was something traditional telecom campaigns never provided.
5. Zero-prepayment model enabled by controlled rights
Because Disney could track every activation in real time and retain full control over entitlements,
Telecom obtained Marvel content with zero upfront payment—a major departure from industry norms.
Outcome
The campaign ran at full national scale from day one in the spring of 2018 and created one of the largest digital content-based loyalty programs in the region:
- Telecom increased customer loyalty and acquisition through high-value Marvel incentives
- Disney gained direct access to a massive new customer base, with verified activation data
- Disney retained complete control over licensing across millions of entitlements
- Customers received premium content for free, plus discounted access to the broader Disney catalog
This case demonstrated the feasibility of distributing premium studio content through telecom infrastructure without compromising rights or requiring large prepayments.
