A week after Charter and Disney made peace on the distribution front, DirecTV and Nexstar have set a multi-year carriage renewal, ending a dispute that started in early July.
The agreement was announced this morning in a brief joint press release, with the companies saying they “greatly appreciate the patience of their subscribers and viewers during this negotiation.” Signals from 176 Nexstar stations as well as cable network NewsNation had been restored on Sunday as the final deal was being completed.
DirecTV has reached a carriage deal with conservative news outlet Newsmax, ending two months of media industry acrimony that spilled into Washington. Under the new multi-year deal, Newsmax will return Thursday to DirecTV satellite systems, DirecTV Stream internet bundles and U-verse cable. With about 13 million subscribers, DirecTV is one of the top pay-TV providers in the U.S.
A few days before the expiration of a carriage deal with DirecTV, Fox Corp. is warning viewers of its networks about a potential blackout as the companies continue to negotiate. On Sunday, Fox began airing a crawl across the bottom of the screen on networks including FS1, the Big Ten Network and Fox News. The message advised viewers of the potential outage. Ahead of a Dec. 2 deadline at midnight PT, the companies are continuing to hold active talks.
Let the games continue. Altice USA and Fox reached a new carriage agreement just before a Friday midnight deadline that would have blacked out Optimum programming for New York area viewers. That would have been disastrous for sports fans, who look forward to Fox’s NFL, college football, and Major League Baseball playoffs coverage in one of the busiest months of the year.
The agreement includes the continued distribution of the full portfolio of Fox brands including Fox News Media, Fox Sports, Fox Network and local Fox O&Os. Fox Weather will also be added to the Fios TV lineup, and Tubi will be included in both Fios TV set top boxes, as well as on many other platforms.
Exclusives
The other shoe appears ready to drop for One America News Network, which lost its biggest pay TV carriage provider, DirecTV, back in April. The controversial far right cable network, known for its reporting of conspiracy theories and its avid support for former president Donald Trump’s “Big Lie” about bogus 2020 election fraud, sees a deal with its last major MVPD partner, Verizon Fios, set to expire on July 30.
Under the continued agreement, AMC Networks’ linear channels — AMC, We TV, BBC America, IFC, and SundanceTV — and streaming service AMC Plus will remain available to Comcast Cable’s Xfinity TV, broadband and XClass customers. Additionally, the pact covers expanded availability of AMC Networks’ other targeted streaming services — Acorn TV, Shudder, Sundance Now, Allblk and the recently acquired Hidive — to Comcast users.
YouTube told viewers Sunday it was restoring service so customers could once again watch networks provided by Disney such as ESPN, FX, National Geographic and local ABC stations.
MSG Networks announced that it has completed a comprehensive, multi-year renewal of its distribution agreement with Verizon Fios. The new deal ensures Verizon Fios customers will continue to have access to MSG Networks and hundreds of exclusive, live games from the New York Knicks, New York Rangers, New Jersey Devils, New York Islanders, Buffalo Sabres and New York Red Bulls as part of their Fios TV packages and through MSG GO, the companies said.
Dish Network and Nexstar Media Group, the No. 1 U.S. owner of local TV stations, have resolved a carriage dispute that took 164 Nexstar stations and cable network WGN America off the air for more than three weeks. The deal was announced just after 1 a.m. ET on Friday, Christmas Day.
On Tuesday night, Dish and Cox Media agreed to their fourth temporary carriage pact this month, allowing 18 stations to continue in the satcaster’s lineup. (The 18 are owned by Apollo Global Management, an equity firm, but they are managed by Cox Media.)
On Friday, Roku and NBCUniversal reached a deal bringing Peacock, NBCU’s recently launched streaming service, to Roku, while also keeping a number of other NBC apps on the platform.
ViacomCBS said it reached a new multi-year renewal of its carriage agreement with Dish Network. The agreement keeps the ViacomCBS broadcast and cable networks on Dish and its Sling TV virtual multichannel video programming distributors. Financial terms were not disclosed.
Byron Allen has withdrawn his $20 billion racial discrimination lawsuit against Comcast. The two parties have entered into a carriage agreement, with the cable company carrying Allen’s 15 TV channels, including The Weather Channel. The deal also includes the distribution of Comedy.TV, Recipe.TV and JusticeCentral.TV on X1, video on demand and TV everywhere.
Resolving a closely tracked negotiation, Comcast and Starz said Monday they have entered into a long-term carriage deal, more than a week before the Dec. 31 expiration date for the previous contract. Along with the pay-TV agreement, a content deal was announced between Starz parent Lionsgate and Comcast’s NBCUniversal. The content pact will see programming from Lionsgate’s library go to NBCU’s forthcoming streaming service Peacock, with NBCU fare streaming on StarzPlay.
MGM-owned Epix has reached an expanded carriage deal with Comcast that will extend the premium network’s reach by adding it to the provider’s premium channel package.
AT&T and Lionsgate-owned Starz have reached a new multi-year carriage deal, avoiding a disruption of the premium network’s offerings on AT&T’s DirecTV, AT&T TV and U-verse cable platforms. The agreement encompasses Starz and Starz Encore linear and HD channels, on-demand and online services.
Epix has closed the final link in the chain. At long last, the pay TV channel owned by MGM has set a distribution pact with AT&T’s DirecTV.
A+E Networks is warning viewers of a possible blackout of A&E Network, Lifetime, History and other channels across DirecTV platforms as the sides go down to the wire on carriage renewal negotiations. DirecTV and A+E Networks are facing a deadline of midnight ET Tuesday to strike a new deal that will keep A+E Networks channels on DirecTV, DirecTV Now and U-verse.
Ending a nearly eight-month standoff, Dish Network and Univision Communications signed a new long-term carriage deal. The companies said restoration of Univision networks and stations on DishLatino and Dish will begin immediately and all pending litigation has been settled.
After negotiating throughout the weekend, AT&T and Viacom announced Monday morning that they had reached an agreement to renew their carriage agreement. Details of the deal were not immediately available.
“Comcast is the largest cable operator and we already have almost all the other major distributors, testifying to the strong demand Newsmax is generating from viewers across the country,” said Newsmax CEO Chris Ruddy, confirming the agreement.
The deal will cover the carriage of CBS-owned stations and affiliates along with Showtime, CBS Sports Network, CBSN and Pop.
Epix, the premium cable network for now co-owned by Viacom, Lionsage and MGM, has negotiated a carriage agreement with broadband provider CenturyLink.
After striking out with the FCC in a carriage discrimination complaint against Comcast, Spanish-language broadcaster Liberman Broadcasting has struck a carriage deal with the No. 2 pay TV platform, DirecTV. The deal will put network Estrella TV on the program guides of more than 20 million satellite TV customers.
The new multi-year agreement means AT&T DirecTV and U-Verse customers will continue to have access to NBCU broadcast and cable networks live and on-demand through linear TV, online and TV Everywhere apps.
AT&T and Discovery Communications have announced a multi-year carriage extension that will keep Discovery’s linear channels on AT&T U-verse and the DirecTV satellite TV platform, expand TV Everywhere rights, and offer digital rights for the upcoming DirecTV Now live-streaming service.
The No. 3 cable provider, which has 6 million residential and commercial customers, has agreed to carry 22 Viacom channels plus Epix, its joint venture with MGM and Lionsgate. Cox also will offer “an expanded selection” of programs via its on-demand platforms which serve TV and mobile devices.
Viacom shares are up more than 9% following the announcement this morning that its channels will remain on Dish Network for several years — ending a war of words and threats that the programming might go dark.
Talks to hammer out a new carriage agreement between the cable giant and the Fox Sports-owned regional sports network broke down, leading Comcast to pull the plug on the channel that airs the games of the New York Yankees, Brooklyn Nets and the NYC Football Club.
Comcast and Discovery Communications announced today that they have signed a long-term, comprehensive renewal of their distribution agreement. The deal spans 12 Discovery U.S. networks across multiple Comcast distribution platforms.
Soon after the FCC approved the AT&T-DirecTV merger, AT&T and Starz reached a new deal for the distribution of such popular shows as Outlander and Power.
Dish Could Lose WTHR, WBNS On Monday
Dispatch Broadcast Group’s NBC affil WTHR Indianapolis and CBS affil WBNS Columbus, Ohio, have posted alerts at their websites saying their current carriage deal with Dish expires on Monday, June 15, at 2 p.m. ET, and they “continue to work toward an agreement with Dish and hope to resolve this situation as soon as possible.”
The companies just made the terse announcement that they have “mutually decided to restore service of CNN, Cartoon Network, Adult Swim, truTV, TCM, HLN, CNN en Espanol and Boomerang, and extend the carriage of TBS and TNT” — but will have no “further comment.”
Dish Network and A+E Networks have agreed to terms for a multi-year contract renewal. This agreement includes OTT multi-stream rights for live and video-on-demand content. It also expands Dish customers’ […]
