Last year T-Mobile TV reported that they planned to launch a TV service to disrupt traditional pay TV. To do this T-Mobile purchased Layer3 TV and started talks with content owners for a streaming service. Right away reports came out that T-Mobile was struggling to get the deals they wanted, and the service was delayed until 2019.
Now it is starting to look like T-Mobile may be rethinking their plans for a TV streaming service and is considering launching an Amazon Channels competitor.
“We don’t have plans to develop an undifferentiated skinny bundle out there,” said T-Mobile President and COO Mike Sievert, speaking during the company’s fourth-quarter earnings call this week. “There are plenty of those. We think there’s a more nuanced role for us to play in helping you get access to the great media brands out there that you love, and to be able to put together your own media subscription in smaller pieces $5, $6 $7, $8 at a time.”
“It’s subscription palooza out there,” T-Mobile’s CCO Sievert said. “Every single media brand either has or is developing an OTT solution, and most of these companies don’t have a way to bring these products to market. They’re learning about that. They don’t have distributed networks like us. They don’t have access to the phones like we have.”
T-Mobile has not said they plan to walk away from a live TV streaming service, but as of today, it looks like they are rethinking the plan. Their rebranded Layer3 service will launch in the first half of 2019 as T-Mobile’s new home TV service. The long-awaited mobile streaming service from T-Mobile has no launch date and seems to be in doubt on how it will work and what it will look like.
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