F.Y.I.

Foxtel pay per view to match DVD release dates

Foxtel customers will be able to pay to watch movies on demand at the same time they get a DVD release in deals revealed by the company today.  

The announcement:

FOXTEL announced today it has reached new landmark agreements with a number of Hollywood studios to start bringing forward movie release dates in line with DVD release. Starting this week, selected titles on FOXTEL’s existing pay-per-view movie service, and its new broadband connected FOXTEL On Demand Internet television service, will be released within the DVD window time-frame.

FOXTEL has pay-per-view deals with all major Hollywood studios – including Twentieth Century FOX, Universal Studios, The Walt Disney Company, MGM, Paramount, Roadshow Television, SONY and Warner Bros – along with a range of independent movie distributors.

Universal Studios has agreed to make all November and December movie titles available at the same time as DVD release, kicking off with Get Him To The Greek on November 3.

FOXTEL’s Executive Director of Product & Sales, Patrick Delany said, “The enhanced agreements with Hollywood studios further cement FOXTEL as the number one entertainment provider in Australia as we will now have blockbuster movies available to our subscribers the same day as DVD release. We are also working towards screening the first new release 3D video-on-demand movie for FOXTEL iQ2 subscribers early in the New Year.

“FOXTEL delivers a world-class array of video-on-demand movie titles on par with any service in the subscription television industry combining broadcast and broadband delivery to our fleet of one million FOXTEL iQ set-top-units for broadcast delivery and over 850,000 Internet-enabled iQ and iQ2 set-top-units with both broadcast and broadband delivery.”

FOXTEL has also reached agreement with Warner Bros for same day as DVD rights to director Christopher Nolan’s Inception on December 8. Agreement has also been reached with Disney for the blockbusters A Christmas Carol and The Sorcerer’s Apprentice, starring Nicolas Cage and produced by Jerry Bruckheimer, to be made available same day as DVD on November 24 and January 12 respectively.

There will be many more movies fast-tracked from cinema to be closer to DVD release over the summer period from studios such as Twentieth Century FOX including Knight & Day and Marmaduke, with plans for more titles in January 2011. Roadshow Television is also testing early release windows with titles such as Killers and The Expendables this December 2010.

Other studios and additional titles will follow.

Source: Foxtel press release

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