beIN Sports, which is operated by Qatari Sports Investments, has released promos on its channels announcing the arrival of a movie channel, sending shockwaves through the industry. We first broke the story on twitter a week ago. Responding to BroadcastPro MEs query on the veracity of the information, one of our Twitter followers shared a photo of […]
beIN Sports, which is operated by Qatari Sports Investments, has released promos on its channels announcing the arrival of a movie channel, sending shockwaves through the industry. We first broke the story on twitter a week ago. Responding to BroadcastPro MEs query on the veracity of the information, one of our Twitter followers shared a photo of an EPG that showed beIN MOVIES1 and beIN MOVIES2 and helped us confirm our tweet.
The movie channel, which will mainly carry Hollywood content, is thought to be one of several that have been planned as part of the sports networks entertainment bouquet that will be rolled out in phases although there has been no official comment from the media entity.
Inside sources told us that the bouquet will eventually include entertainment and documentary channels although the first phase will only see the launch of beIN Movies.
It is not known at this point, whether the channels will be part of a subscription model or broadcast free-to-air. However, it has been widely speculated that beIN will offer its entertainment bouquet at a much lower subscription rate making it accessible to more viewers.
While the rise of a cheaper entertainment network could spell competition for OSN, which is presently the only pay TV network in the region, one also wonders if it could also equally compel free-to-air networks like MBC Group to rethink its FTA business model and enter the subscription model.
