AT&T continues to quickly amass channels to its upcoming DirecTV Now service, announcing today that it has reached an expanded carriage agreement with Scripps Networks Interactive that includes digital rights for DirecTV's new virtual platforms.
This means that channels including HGTV, Food Network and Travel Channel will not only remain on the programming guides of AT&T U-verse and the DirecTV satellite service, but also on the streaming DirecTV Now, as well as upcoming mobile programming service DirecTV Freeview.
“Scripps Networks’ content will deliver more value as an important part of AT&T’s new DirecTV Now and DirecTV Freeview streaming services,” said Dan York, chief content officer for AT&T, in a statement.
AT&T had previously announced programming deals with Disney, NBCUniversal, Discovery Networks, HBO and — earlier this week — HBO’s Time Warner corporate sibling, Turner Networks.
AT&T has not yet announced when and if it will have live-streaming deals in place for CBS Corp., 21st Century Fox and AMC Networks — conglomerates which own the bulk of the as-of-yet unaccounted for networks.
Speaking earlier this week at a Goldman Sachs investor event, AT&T CEO Randall Stephenson said DirecTV Now will roll out later this year with more than 100 channels at a “very aggressive price point.” And the content will be zero-rated for the company’s wireless customers.
“We’ll be rolling it out in a couple of months,” Stephenson added. “We’re talking 100-plus channels at a very, very aggressive price point. And when you buy this content, the data required to stream it onto your mobile device is incorporated into the price of the content…. If you choose to use that in a mobile environment on AT&T, your data cost is incorporated into your content cost."
For more:
- read this Scripps press release
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