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Univision will launch a global Spanish-language streaming service in 2022
Univision is taking on Netflix by launching a Spanish-language streaming service in 2022, complete with a free option.
Facebook plans to double its minority employees in the next five years
Facebook is more diverse than it was six years ago, but the company admits it has a long way to go. Today, Facebook released its 2019 Diversity Report, and while it employs more women and minorities than it did a few years ago, it's still predominantly male. In the US, the majority of its employees are White or Asian. But those numbers are expected to change. In the next five years, Facebook hopes at least half of its workforce will be women, under-represented minorities, people with disabilities and veterans.
Intel says its staff is now representative of the US 'skilled workforce'
In 2015, Intel made a $300 million commitment to ensuring its workforce accurately represents the US skilled labor market, particularly with regards to women and underrepresented minorities (African-American, Hispanic and Native American people). It originally aimed to meet this target by 2020, before moving the timeframe up to 2018 last year. It now claims it has achieved that goal.
Facebook's tougher policies delay Hispanic political ads
Facebook's stricter ad policies may be creating further complications for legitimate campaigns. Strategists for Hispanic organizations have told the Washington Post that their political ads typically require "several days" to reach Facebook simply because they're targeting a Spanish-language audience. As the social network's policies require it to both review ads targeted at ethnic groups and fight racial discrimination, the process takes considerably more time than ads aimed at a general audience.
Univision plans Netflix-style streaming service
Univision's streaming ambitions are growing beyond live video. The Hispanic-American broadcaster has unveiled an on-demand service that gives you access to both its own shows as well as partners like the BBC and Viacom. Full access to live and on-demand content will cost you $8 per month, but current pay TV customers can spring for the on-demand portion for a $3 monthly fee.
Facebook is slowly becoming less white and less male
Facebook's latest diversity stats are in, and it seems that while the process is glacially-slow, the company is becoming less white and less male. In the last year, the number of women in tech has risen from 17% to 19%, with women accounting for 27% of all new graduate hires in engineering and 21% of all new technical hires. The number of Hispanics at the company has increased from 4% to 5%, while the number of black people has risen from 2% to 3%. These figures don't represent a particularly impressive move forward from last year, but they are in many cases much better than they were in 2014. According to a blog post by the company, much of this "success" can be attributed to a range of diversity-focused programs, designed to eradicate the White Boys' Club mentality that has long-plagued Facebook's boardrooms.
Univision Now brings live and on-demand streaming to Roku
Hispanic US TV broadcaster Univision just got easier to find thanks to a hookup with Roku. The Univision Now streaming app is available on Roku boxes, Roku TVs from TCL and Roku apps on PCs or mobile devices. For $6 a month or $50 per year, users can stream live programming including telenovelas like Pasión y Poder, reality shows, awards shows and UniMás sports content including Liga MX and MLS fútbol.
Google launches Hispanic coding initiative in eight US cities
The Hispanic Heritage Foundation's (HHF) president, Jose Antonio Tijerino, thinks that "seeing a latino programmer shouldn't be akin to seeing a unicorn," so his group is trying to do something about it. Together with Google, it launched Code as a Second Language (CSL) courses in eight cities, including New York, Las Angeles and Miami. The idea is to introduce students to coding through 1-2 hour sessions, then steer them to the LOFT (Latinos on Fast Track) network for ongoing online instruction. Students who complete that training could later be granted internships and possibly full-time positions with Fortune 500 companies.
T-Mobile launching Spanish-language mobile network with Univision
Move over Jennifer Lopez and Verizon, as Univision has just partnered with T-Mobile to create a new Spanish-language cellphone service called Univision Mobile. Underpinned by T-Mo's network, the new partnership will target the 56 million strong Hispanic American market with "custom-built" plans. Like its parent carrier, those will be contract-free starting at $30 for unlimited texts and calls and $45 for a 2.5GB web plan. Both will get unlimited international texting and 100 minutes of free calls to mobile phones or landlines in Mexico and seven other Latin American countries. The new company may not have J-Lo fronting it like Viva Movil, but users will no doubt be able to catch her on their phones -- Univision will offer "insights and programming content" for the new venture.
Dell freshens up Inspiron M5030 with Spanish-language keyboard, claims it's first of its kind in US
The Athlon-powered M5030 from Dell hardly looked like a machine that would be bearing an "industry first" label when it launched in September of last year, but now it's doing exactly that thanks to an intriguing new mod from its maker. The 15.6-incher is being released with its keyboard and Windows 7 installation customized in Spanish, neither of which would be unusual were it not for the fact that it's going to be on sale in the US. It's not exactly a vast overhaul, as only a couple of physical keys are swapped out and switching Win 7 into and out of Spanish mode can be done in the time it takes to click a mouse, but still, it's significant in that it services the speakers of the States' second most commonly used language. Pricing for the M5030 en español is set at $499 and includes a 320GB HDD and 4GB of RAM. For an entirely free video of an excitable Dell employee telling you about it, jump past the break.
GameStop sees highest-volume stores on US/Mexico border
GameStop COO Paul Raines notes that Latino consumers are apparently quite important to the profitability of the company. Speaking with Hispanic Market Weekly, Raines reveals that the highest-volume stores in the company are those located along the US-Mexico border in Texas -- which has led to discussions of the chain expanding into Mexico.GameStop isn't directly targeting the Latino community with Spanish-language ads and signage, so much as hiring bilingual associates. Raines states that of the company's 5000-plus stores, between 600-800 are in areas where the Latino population is over 40 percent. [Via IndustryGamers]
Holiday profiling: Xbox 360 is perfect gift for Hispanics, Microsoft survey finds
The results of the first-ever Xbox 360 Hispanic Holiday Entertainment Survey are in! And wouldn't you know, Xbox 360 is the perfect fit for the Hispanic persuasion1. Did you know: More Hispanics want a gift that brings their family together (89% vs. 64% of general population) More Hispanics are looking for gifts that people can enjoy throughout the year (95% vs. 85% of general population) More Hispanics are looking for affordable ways to entertain their family over the holidays (85% vs. 81% of general population) Many more Hispanics would rather buy one gift for their whole family than spend money on lots of individual gifts (83 % vs. 52% of general population) Lips en Español features 17 songs in Spanish by artists such as Alejandro Sanz, Belanova, Fanny Lu, La Factoria, Luis Miguel, Pimpinela and Selena (42.5% less songs than the all-English version!) How do these compelling figures all add up? We're glad you asked! You see, Xbox 360 is the one, affordable gift that brings the family together throughout the year. In short, not buying an Xbox 360 this holiday season is simply Un-Hispanic.
Apple Announces iTunes Latino, Telemundo and mun2 in iTunes Store
Apple has launched a new Latino section in the US iTunes Store featuring Latin music, music videos, television shows, audiobooks and podcasts. "Latin music has been a huge hit on iTunes and now we're bringing music fans even more of what they love in a dedicated area on the iTunes Store," said Eddy Cue, Apple's VP of iTunes, in a press release. In a related press release, Apple also announced new shows from Telemundo (iTS link) and bilingual programming from their youth-oriented mun2 network (iTS link). Latin TV shows, telenovelas and reality content are all now available in the iTunes Store as well, rounding up what looks like a strong new offering for Apple's darling content store.
Dexa, the new Hispanic MVNO, launches in LA
If you've been looking for an MVNO that speaks your language, and that language happens to be Español, then you're in luck. Dexa is a new GSM-based MVNO that plans to cater to the large Hispanic demand for prepaid phone service. The best guess for the actual carrier is Cingular, because Dexa is copying their marketing speak of "fewest dropped calls." That means there won't be data available to Dexa customers, just voice service, since Cingular doesn't provide data to MVNO customers. Right now Dexa is only available in LA, but with the large Hispanic market in the US we have a feeling they could be expanding fairly soon.
