Advanced Television

OTT not enemy says cable

March 9, 2017

Nick Snow @ Cable Congress

OTT is not the enemy and we can work together was the message in Brussels. Liberty Global, through Eric Tveter, CEO Central and Eastern Europe, said the relationship with Netflix was good for both partners and was revenue generating, though he did allow the margins were not comparable to more traditional premium services.

Tveter also revealed Liberty Global was considering a similar integration deal with Amazon’s Prime, though Balan Nair, CTO, implied in a later session this was some way off. Tveter was confident cable’s role as a trusted aggregator – including SVoD services – and broadband and mobile provider meant its future was secure and he said consumers would see that buying a series of ‘skinny bundles’ would actually be more expensive.

Com Hem CEO Anders Nilsson agreed cable’s purpose was to “aggregate content in the right way at a reasonable price.” But he added: “The question remains what happens if some of the big guys come in and try and run over us? That could happen and then we may end up as a dumb pipe in the end…. even the worst case scenario is probably not that bad”.

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