The erstwhile DirecTV Now has come full circle. Almost. 

As part of AT&T's just-completed spinoff of its premium pay TV services to a joint venture operated by private equity firm TPG, the streaming portion of the portfolio has been rebranded into one service called "DirecTV Stream." 

That will now be the "single brand for video streaming services previously launched by AT&T, excluding HBO Max," AT&T said in its announcement Monday. DirecTV satellite TV will remain a separate service, as will U-verse TV, which AT&T stopped selling to new customers several years ago. (Notably, U-verse TV rated No. 1 among U.S. pay TV platforms in a recent customer satisfaction survey.)

AT&T streaming video services not named HBO Max include AT&T TV Now, the virtual MVPD that was originally launched in November 2016 under the "DirecTV Now" moniker. AT&T rebranded skinny-bundled live-streaming service, originally valued priced at $35 a month, as AT&T TV Now in the summer of 2019, as it prepared to launch a more premium IP-based, full-bundle pay TV platform, AT&T TV, featuring traditional contracts and largesse. 

In January, AT&T announced that AT&T TV Now and AT&T TV would be merged into one service, with the AT&T TV's proprietary Android TV-based set-top being an optional accessory. 

At the end of Q1, AT&T reported just under 15.9 million remaining "premium TV" customers, a grouping that includes DirecTV satellite, AT&T TV streaming and legacy service U-verse TV. 

In AT&T's little shell game, it's hard to discern how many subscribers each individual platform has at this point. 

App downloads of the major virtual MVPDs were up 63% in June, most likely driven by heavy sports content and the run up to the Summer Olympic Games in Tokyo, according to a report by Evercore ISI media analyst Vijay Jayant.

YouTube TV again accounted for the largest slice of overall vMVPD downloads -- 44% -- but it was sports-centric FuboTV that had the biggest year-over-year gain in the segment --312%, according to Jayant. FuboTV was a close second to YouTube TV in terms of download share (33%), followed by Sling TV (18%) and AT&T TV (9%).

“Virtual MVPD app download trends improved vs. the prior few months likely driven by the strong sports calendar and lead into the Olympics,” Jayant wrote in his report, adding that May downloads rose 11% year-over-year, driven by FuboTV and YouTube TV. 

Also Read: Fubo TV CEO David Gandler Says VMVPDs Are Pay TV's Future Gateway 

“Similar to trends in prior months, YouTube continues to dominate in terms of vMVPD download market share followed by fuboTV, SlingTV, and AT&T TV,” Jayant wrote. 

June was a big TV sports month ratings-wise with the NBA Playoffs,  Major League Baseball, the U.S. Olympic Trials, the NCAA baseball tournament and UEFA European Championship all attracting strong ratings. 

The Summer Olympic Games are scheduled for July 23-Aug. 8 in Tokyo and NBCUniversal plans to air about 7,000 hours of content on its broadcast and cable networks as well as digital platforms including Peacock and Telemundo Deportes. 

For SVOD providers, the month was mixed. Netflix app downloads were down about 25% year-over-year, a slight improvement over May’s 30% decline. Showtime (up 132%), Disney Plus (up 114%) and HBO Max (up 63%) were the top performers in the sector, while Hulu rose 4% and Amazon Prime Video increased 1% in the period.

HBO Max, according to Jayant, dominated the SVOD space with strong releases of originals and library content in June. Its June 29 expansion into 39 Latin American and Caribbean countries should help drive downloads in July, he said. 

Newer entrants Discovery Plus (launched Jan. 4) and Paramount Plus (launched on March 4) were not included in year-over-year estimates. But Jayant wrote that month-over-month trends at Discovery Plus have been marginally weaker, with June 2021 downloads at about 1.2 million, fewer than the 1.5 million downloads in May. Paramount Plus’s ad-supported tiered launch June 7 helped push total downloads to 2.3 million in June, up from 1.4 million in May. 

Disney Plus was driven mainly by gains in Latin America, ahead of its planned August launch of the Star Plus general entertainment streaming service and a new promotion that will give new Amazon Music Unlimited subscribers Disney Plus for six months free. Existing Amazon Music Unlimited customers can get Disney Plus for free for three months. 

On the ad-supported side, Jayant estimated that app downloads were up 48% year-over-year in June, fueled by gains at Tubi TV (up 49%). Trends for Pluto TV were down about 3% for the month, but the ViacomCBS-owned streamer still holds the biggest share of download activity at 38%, according to Jayant. NBC Universal’s Peacock launched in April 2020, so year-over-year comps were not shown, but Jayant wrote the service has a 26% share of download activity, close behind Pluto. 

This week, AT&T ended its controversial “sponsored data” policy, which exempted use of the telecom’s streaming video services, notably HBO Max and AT&T TV, from counting against data caps of AT&T wireless and wireline internet products. 

It’s unclear as to specifically how many AT&T customers this will impact. But it doesn’t appear that it will be many.

On the mobile side, AT&T has been promotionally tying HBO Max only to unlimited data plans. Meanwhile, on the wireline side, the telecom has been bundling HBO Max, as well as its IP-based pay TV service, AT&T TV, with fiber internet products, which don’t have usage caps. 

AT&T does, however, employ usage-based pricing on non-fiber wireline internet products—a pricing policy that was suspended at the outset of the pandemic, but returned at the beginning of 2021. Notably, Comcast, the biggest ISP in the U.S, pushed back plans to reinstate a 1.2 terabyte usage cap.

AT&T has been phasing out DSL for some time, but it still reported 653,000 DSL connections as of the end of the second quarter of 2020, located in Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina, and Tennessee. These customers are capped at a very low overhead of 150 gigabytes of monthly data usage before having to pay an additional $10 for each additional 50 gigs they use. 

If these users are trying to stream video, 150 GB goes fast. 

Given that the fastest downstream speed offered for AT&T’s legacy DSL services is 6 megabits per second, it’s highly doubtful that there are a lot of AT&T DSL users even attempting to stream HBO Max’s premiere of the Snyder Cut Thursday in 4K/HDR. But they'll still use 0.9 GB an hour trying to stream base-level HD resolution (720p).

AT&T also caps its limited number of LTE fixed wireless customers at 350 GB. 

And, perhaps most importantly, AT&T Internet customers who have downstream speeds of 300 Mbps and below are capped at 1 terabyte. Of AT&T’s nearly 15.4 million wireline broadband users, fiber customers, uncapped with speeds of 500 Mbps and above, represent the fastest growing cohort. But most AT&T wireline subs still fall into the group capped at 1 TB. 

For the millions of customers in this group, streaming 4K content on services including HBO Max and AT&T TV will chew up about 7.2 GB per hour. According to OpenVault, a company that consults cable operators and telecoms about how their networks are used, 14.1% of U.S. internet customers exceeded an average monthly usage of 1 TB in 2020. That number will undoubtedly grow in 2021, most likely in a significant way. 

A Little Background

In 2014, AT&T introduced the concept of “sponsored data,” which allowed services running on its networks to pay for the privilege of having their customers’ data usage “zero rated”—meaning, it didn’t count against customer usage caps. 

Ultimately, the only services that really ended up using sponsored data were owned by AT&T. And this week, the telecom ended the practice, blaming California net neutrality laws aimed at protecting consumers. 

"Unfortunately, under the California law we are now prohibited from providing certain data features to consumers free of charge," AT&T wrote on its website. "Given that the Internet does not recognize state borders, the new law not only ends our ability to offer California customers such free data services but also similarly impacts our customers in states beyond California.”

AT&T says it’s listening to its homebound customers and increasing the number of simultaneous streams available on its AT&T TV platform to 20 from three. 

The change won’t affect the price of the service, the telecom said. 

Notably, users can only engage in 20 simultaneous streams from one IP address. Out-of-home streams — those not tied to the same internet protocol address — are limited to three. 

Also, some of AT&T’s programming deals restrict it from offering 20 simultaneous streams for certain networks, notably Fox channels, Starz, Showtime, the NHL Network and PBS. 

AT&T said it is also turning its 500-hour DVR service, a $10-a-month add-on, into an unlimited recording offering. The 20-hour cloud DVR, which comes with the base service, is unchanged. 

AT&T finished 2020 down another 5.1 million sub­scribers across its four pay TV platforms. It has struck a deal to spin off DirecTV, U-verse TV and AT&T TV Now into a separate company with private-equity firm TPG.

AT&T said it reach an agreement with investment company TPG to spin off its pay-TV assets -- DirecTV, AT&T TV and Uverse -- into a new company.

AT&T bought DirecTV in 2015 for $49 billion. The new deal reportedly values the pay-TV assets at $15 billion. AT&T also bought WarnerMedia, but has been trying to pivot its entertainment business from pay-TV to streaming with HBO Max.

AT&T will own 70% of the new company and TPG will own 30%. As part of the transaction it will receive $7.8 billion in cash and the assumption of debt from the new company. TPG will contribute $1.8 billion in cash to the new company.

Also Read: Cord Cutting Still Nearly Double For the Big Four U.S. Pay TV Providers Over 2018

The CEO of the new company will be Bill Morrow, who is now CEO of AT&T’s U.S. video unit.

DirecTV’s agreement for NFL Sunday Ticket will be moving to the new company.

“This agreement aligns with our investment and operational focus on connectivity and content, and the strategic businesses that are key to growing our customer relationships across 5G wireless, fiber and HBO Max. And it supports our deliberate capital allocation commitment to invest in growth areas, sustain the dividend at current levels, focus on debt reduction and restructure or monetize non-core assets,” said AT&T CEO John Stankey.

Also Read: AT&T and DirecTV: Divorce Won’t Be Easy

“As the pay-TV industry continues to evolve, forming a new entity with TPG to operate the U.S. video business separately provides the flexibility and dedicated management focus needed to continue meeting the needs of a high-quality customer base and managing the business for profitability. TPG is the right partner for this transaction and creating a new entity is the right way to structure and manage the video business for optimum value creation,” Stankey said.

“Video remains a core service for tens of millions of households. Since its launch in 1994, DireTV has continually evolved its product, content and service to provide customers an industry-leading video offering. As video consumption habits evolve, the new DirecTV will continue investing in its offering to provide value to its customers, including through next-generation streaming pay-TV services,” said David Trujillo, partner at TPG. “TPG looks forward to partnering with AT&T and new DirecTV leadership to bring the right focus, attention and execution in support of new DirecTV position as a competitive video provider for the benefit of its customers and employees.”

Also Read: Fixed and Dilated

AT&T says it’s listening to its homebound customers and is increasing the number of simultaneous streams available on its AT&T TV platform from three to 20. 

The telecom said the change will occur automatically for customers starting Thursday, and it won’t affect the price of the service. 

Notably, users can only engage in 20 simultaneous streams from one IP address. Out-of-home streams—those not tied to the same IP address—are limited to three. 

Also, some of AT&T’s programming deals restrict it from offering 20 simultaneous streams for certain networks, notably Fox channels, Starz, Showtime, the NHL Network and PBS. 

AT&T said it is also turning its 500-hour DVR service, a $10-a-month add-on, into an unlimited recording offering. The 20-hour cloud DVR, which comes with the base service, is unchanged. 

AT&T finished 2020 down another 5.1 million subscribers across its four pay TV platforms. The telecom is reportedly near a deal to sell a substantial minority stake in DirecTV, U-verse and AT&T TV Now to private equity firm TPG. 

AT&T is “nearing” a deal to sell a “substantial” minority stake in its DirecTV satellite TV service, as well as its U-verse and AT&T TV Now platforms, to private equity firm TPG, CNBC reports. 

It was reported last month that AT&T was in serious talks with TPG, but the inclusion of the legacy U-verse platform, as well as the virtual MPVD AT&T TV Now, is somewhat of a new twist, although it had been previously bantered about in speculation.

The new report, based on the usual unnamed sources close to the negotiations, said the deal would value the assets at around $15 billion—also in line with previous leaks. 

AT&T didn't immediately respond to Next TV's inquiry for comment and confirmation.

AT&T would use the proceeds to pay down $150 billion in debt, partly accrued with the $49 billion purchase of DirecTV back in 2015.

In 2020, AT&T lost 3.261 million paid users across DirecTV, U-verse and AT&T TV Now, as well as its recently launched, IP-delivered AT&T TV platform. This came after the telecom shed nearly 4.1 million subscribers across its pay TV platforms in 2019.

AT&T finished 2020 with just 17.2 million pay TV subscribers across its platforms—a total that had surpassed 24 million as recently as 2018.

AT&T stopped selling new U-verse subscriptions over a year ago. And it ceased selling new AT&T TV Now vMPVD bundles last month. The telecom's video strategy is now centered around WarnerMedia and its HBO Max subscription steaming service, but the conglomerate is still actively selling AT&T TV as a bundled complement to services like fiber-based high-speed internet, as well as a means to get HBO Max into more homes. 

Updated: This story was updated to include details on AT&T's new pay TV strategy.

AT&T has simplified its rather confusing pay TV strategy, folding the virtual MVPD AT&T TV Now into AT&T TV, while orienting the latter into a vMVPD service that lacks contracts and proprietary leased equipment.

AT&T TV Now's remaining subscribers, which totaled 683,000 as of the end of September, will be rolled into AT&T TV, the company's more traditionally structured pay TV service.

AT&T TV, which also operates on the open internet, will move from annual to monthly contracts, and will no longer require customers to lease a proprietary Android TV set-tops. In addition to those AT&T's device, the service will now run on Roku, Amazon Fire TV, Apple TV players and Google Chromecast dongles and sticks; iOS and Android mobile devices; and Samsung smart TVs, the company said.

“We’re bringing more value and simplicity by merging these two streaming services into a single AT&T TV experience,” said Vince Torres, senior VP of marketing for AT&T. “Customers can stream the best collection of live and on-demand programming on devices they already have, or they can get our exclusive AT&T TV Stream device to enjoy enhanced features and functionality.”

The move effectively kills AT&T TV Now, which started life as the $35-a-month DirecTV Now back in November 2016, growing on promotional steroids to reach 1.8 million subscribers by the summer of 2018. 

AT&T TV Now becomes the second major competitor to bow out following the shuttering a year ago of Sony PlayStation Vue. 

AT&T TV Now’s base-tier service offered 45-plus channels for $55 a month. AT&T TV is base priced at $70 a month for 65-plus channels.

 AT&T TV monthly-contract packages come with 20-hours of cloud DVR storage included. For an additional $10 a month, customers can upgrade to 500 hours of storage.

So, if you signed up for DirecTV Now four years ago, your $35-a-month skinny bundle has doubled in price and girth.

It's the latest video move by AT&T, which has given up on its $49 billion purchase of DirecTV in 2015, and is now focused on its $85 billion acquisition of Time Warner Inc. and the resulting launch of SVOD service HBO Max. 

For AT&T, traditional pay TV is now being simplified down to AT&T TV, the IP-based service, launch last year and now largely serving to underpin the telecom's rollouts of fiber internet and fixed 5G services. 

AT&T was already in the process of sunsetting its legacy pay TV platform, U-verse. And it’s trying to sell its satellite TV platform, DirecTV.

In an advertising claim version of "storage wars," The National Advertising Division (NAD) of BBB National Programs has recommended that Dish pull the plug on some claims about its Hopper 3 DVR's superiority to that of others and the company has agreed to do so.

Also Read: NAD Has Issues With Comcast Claim

Streaming service AT&T TV, which uses cloud DVRs, had complained about Dish claims in an online and TV ad that the Hopper 3 was: “TV’s most powerful DVR”; “Records . . . 2 times more than our competition” (or “more shows”); and has “twice the storage space . . . as any of our competitors” (or superior storage space)."

DISH had offered up a consumer perception survey to bolster its contention that its "Girls' Night In" TV ad does not "convey and implied comparative message" and that even if it did, the comparison was to other hardware-based DVRS, not cloud DVRs--which AT&T offers.

NAD said the survey's open ended questions "simply did not test whether panelists took away a comparative message from the advertisement."

Also Read: Verizon Will Drop Certain 5G Ad Claims

Since NAD discounted the survey as evidence, it said it "stepped into the shoes of the reasonable consumer," and concluded that consumer would reasonably assume the claims were a comparison to all types of DVR including AT&T TV and its cloud DVRs.

As to Dish's uncontested claim that its Hopper 3 records "up to 16 shows at once and holds up to 2,000 hours of SD programming or 500 hours of HD programming," NAD concluded that Hopper 3 does not have superior recording or storage capabilities to could DVRs, and said that, in fact, Cox's DVR service beats Hopper 3 on number of shows recorded and hours of video stored.

According to NAD, Dish said it would go along with the self-regulatory process--NAD decisions are recommendations, not orders--and agree to, as NAD recommended, "discontinue or modify [the claims] to limit the comparisons to better fit the support provided." But Dish also said it was disappointed that its consumer perception evidence was not persuasive.

AT&T reportedly wants to divest more than just DirecTV.

According to a CNBC, the telecom is also looking at possibly also selling minority stakes in two of its other pay TV platforms, virtual MVPD AT&T TV Now, and its legacy U-verse TV service. 

The telecom’s AT&T TV service, launched earlier this year, isn’t mentioned in the report. 

Also read: AT&T Presses on with 'Fire Sale' DirecTV Auction (Report)

The questionably credible New York Post reported last month that AT&T was talking Apollo Management and other private equity firms about a “fire sale” deal that would unload the DirecTV satellite TV business for around $15.75 billion. (AT&T paid nearly $67 billion for it back in 2015, factoring in debt.)

On Tuesday, CNBC reported that AT&T is talking to the same private equity companies about taking stakes ranging from 30% - 49% in AT&T TV Now and U-verse TV. For the latter, AT&T would keep the wireline infrastructure and technology that backs the U-verse brand, as well as the U-verse broadband component. Notably, AT&T stopped selling U-verse TV to new customers earlier this year. 

The rollup would effectively take the declining portion of AT&T’s pay TV businesses off its balance sheets. 

Final bids are reportedly due in December. 

Also read: AT&T Pay TV Losses ‘Slow’ to 627K in Q3

AT&T reported the loss of 590,000 customers in the third quarter across its “premium” pay TV brands, DirecTV, U-verse TV and AT&T TV. The telecom said the latter service, an IP-based linear service that launched earlier this year, is fueling its wireline fiber growth. So, ostensibly, it’s growing. But AT&T hasn’t said by how much. 

AT&T TV Now saw declining blood loss of 37,000 customers in Q3. But AT&T has long since stopped aggressive promotions that drove the live streaming service to a peak of around 2 million customers in the summer of 2018. AT&T TV Now had only 683,000 remaining customers as of the end of September. 

As analysts explain it, AT&T has a narrow path to walk with its declining pay TV assets. It needs to find a way to cut costs, without further accelerating cord cutting and the cash-generating potential of the platforms. AT&T also has to maintain shareholder dividends while paying down enough debt to meet the demands of credit rating agencies. All the while, the telecom has to find money to invest in growth business, such as HBO Max and the fiber deployment which AT&T TV is part of.  

AT&T reported the loss of 886,000 “premium video” customers in the second quarter, but company CFO John Stephens said he was “real pleased” with the newest addition to that service category, AT&T TV.

“It has been successful and it’s working,” Stephens told equity analysts during AT&T’s second quarter earnings call last week. “Once again, because of the pandemic, some of the home installs and some of that activity has been limited, so once again we’re cautious as we come out of that.” 

RELATED: AT&T Stock Slips on Mixed Q2

AT&T’s “premium video” segment includes satellite TV service DirecTV, which is now primarily being marketed in rural areas where cable broadband is more scarce; U-verse TV, a legacy pay TV service no longer being sold to new customers; and AT&T TV, an Android TV-based service that combines IP video delivery with traditional pay TV accoutrements (i.e fatter bundles, fees and contracts). AT&T TV rolled out nationally in March.

AT&T hasn’t disclosed how many customers have adopted AT&T TV.

Stephens did say, “AT&T TV gains helped offset premium video losses.”

He added that AT&T TV had a 90% attachment rate with AT&T wireline broadband, meaning 90% of those who signed up for high-speed internet also took the new pay TV service.

AT&T has indicated that a primary AT&T TV agenda is to spur sales of the company’s fiber-to-the-home broadband service. AT&T said it added 220,000 fiber internet customers in Q2.

AT&T has also touted the self-install nature of AT&T TV as a cost reducer, requiring now truck roll or satellite launches.

Those reduced costs have yet to show up on AT&T’s balance sheet, Stephens told analysts, but they will.

“It’s a challenging business,” Stephens said, summing up the pay TV gambit in the age of cord-cutting. “We continue to focus on cost savings, and we continue to generate a lot of cash out of it.”

For more stories like this, go to nexttv.com. 

AT&T reported the loss of 886,000 “premium video” customers in the second quarter, but company CFO John Stephens said he was “real pleased” with the newest addition to that service category, AT&T TV. 

“It has been successful and it’s working,” Stephens told equity analysts during AT&T’s second quarter earnings call last week. “Once again, because of the pandemic, some of the home installs and some of that activity has been limited, so once again we’re cautious as we come out of that.” 

Also read: AT&T Loses Another 886K Linear Pay TV Customers in Q2

AT&T’s “premium video” segment includes satellite TV service DirecTV, which is now primarily being marketed in rural areas where cable broadband is more scarce; U-verse TV, a legacy pay TV service no longer being sold to new customers; and AT&T TV, an Android TV-based service that combines IP video delivery with traditional pay TV accoutrements (i.e fatter bundles, fees and contracts). AT&T TV rolled out nationally in March. 

AT&T hasn’t disclosed how many customers have adopted AT&T TV. 

Stephens did say, “AT&T TV gains helped offset premium video losses.”

He added that AT&T TV had a 90% attachment rate with AT&T wireline broadband, meaning 90% of those who signed up for high-speed internet also took the new pay TV service.

AT&T has indicated that a primary AT&T TV agenda is to spur sales of the company’s fiber-to-the-home broadband service. AT&T said it added 220,000 fiber internet customers in Q2. 

AT&T has also touted the self-install nature of AT&T TV as a cost reducer, requiring now truck roll or satellite launches. 

Those reduced costs have yet to show up on AT&T’s balance sheet, Stephens told analysts, but they will. 

“It’s a challenging business,” Stephens said, summing up the pay TV gambit in the age of cord-cutting. “We continue to focus on cost savings, and we continue to generate a lot of cash out of it.”

AT&T said it lost another 886,000 customers in the second quarter across its “premium video” portfolio, a grouping that includes linear pay TV services DirecTV, U-verse TV and AT&T TV. 

The attrition represents an acceleration from the 778,000 premium video customers AT&T lost in the second quarter of 2019. It lost 879,000 customers in the first quarter. 

AT&T announced across-the-tiers price increases for AT&T TV and DirecTV earlier this month. It is no longer selling U-Verse TV. 

The company also reported another 68,000 lost subscribers for its virtual pay TV service, AT&T TV Now, with its base whittled to just 720,000 customers as of the end of June. 

AT&T’s revenue from pay TV video was down 13.2% to $7 billion in the second quarter. The company attributed it to the subscriber declines, as well as the impact of COVID-19 on advertising, commercial revenue and “certain fees.”

Also read: AT&T TV: Everything You Need to Know About the Streaming Version of AT&T’s Premium Pay TV Service

Last year, ahead of the March national rollout of AT&T TV, company executives expressed hope that the new IP-based service would stem the steady customer losses being experienced by decaying satellite TV brand DirecTV, as well as U-verse, a pay TV product AT&T no longer sells to new customers. 

While AT&T TV now certainly hasn’t reversed the company’s linear pay TV fortunes, AT&T does credit it for sales of bundled fiber broadband services—AT&T announced the addition of 225,000 fiber-based high-speed internet customers in Q2. 

AT&T has quietly initiated cross-tier price increases for its new IP-based pay TV platform, AT&T TV, as well as its legacy satellite TV brand, DirecTV.

The base “Entertainment” package for AT&T TV will see its first-year promotional price shoot up $10 a month to $60. The mid-tier “Choice” plan is rising from $55 a month to $65; the Xtra bundle is going from $65 a month to $75; and the top-end “Ultimate” AT&T TV tier is rising from $70 a month to $80.

The price increases only apply to first-year promotional bills. For example, after the first 12 months, the price of the Android TV-based service’s base Entertainment package still increases to same $93 a month.

The price increases were first discovered by analyst Phillip Swann. They apply only to new customers.

Also read: AT&T TV: Everything You Need to Know About the Streaming Version of AT&T’s Premium Pay TV Service

AT&T TV launched nationwide March 2. The wireless giant has yet to disclose subscriber metrics for the new service, which has contracts, early termination fees and all the trappings of traditional pay TV, even though it’s delivered over the open internet to an Android TV device.

Visit Next TV to read more stories like this one. 

AT&T did disclose that it lost 897,000 customers in the first quarter across its linear pay TV platforms. Presumably, most of those losses came from DirecTV. But that isn’t stopping AT&T from upping its satellite TV pricing, too.

Also across tiers, new DirecTV customers are paying $10 a more a month, starting with the base 155-channel Select bundle, which is rising from $50 a month to $60.

AT&T has stopped soliciting new signups for its third traditional pay TV platform, U-verse.

Also read: YouTube TV Raises Price $15 After Adding ViacomCBS Channels

The AT&T TV and DirecTV bumps are only part of a video-industry-wide price-increase news cycle, with virtual pay TV operators YouTube TV and fuboTV also announcing monthly bill bumps. 

AT&T has quietly initiated cross-tier price increases for its new IP-based pay TV platform, AT&T TV, as well as its legacy satellite TV brand, DirecTV.

The base “Entertainment” package for AT&T TV will see its first-year promotional price shoot up $10 a month to $60. The mid-tier “Choice” plan is rising from $55 a month to $65; the Xtra bundle is going from $65 a month to $75; and the top-end “Ultimate” AT&T TV tier is rising from $70 a month to $80. 

The price increases only apply to first-year promotional bills. For example, after the first 12 months, the price of the Android TV-based service’s base Entertainment package still increases to same $93 a month. 

The price increases were first discovered by analyst Phillip Swann. They apply only to new customers. 

Also read: AT&T TV: Everything You Need to Know About the Streaming Version of AT&T’s Premium Pay TV Service

AT&T TV launched nationwide March 2. The wireless giant has yet to disclose subscriber metrics for the new service, which has contracts, early termination fees and all the trappings of traditional pay TV, even though it’s delivered over the open internet to an Android TV device. 

AT&T did disclose that it lost 897,000 customers in the first quarter across its linear pay TV platforms. Presumably, most of those losses came from DirecTV. But that isn’t stopping AT&T from upping its satellite TV pricing, too. 

Also across tiers, new DirecTV customers are paying $10 a more a month, starting with the base 155-channel Select bundle, which is rising from $50 a month to $60. 

AT&T has stopped soliciting new signups for its third traditional pay TV platform, U-verse. 

Also read: YouTube TV Raises Price $15 After Adding ViacomCBS Channels

The AT&T TV and DirecTV bumps are only part of a video-industry-wide price-increase news cycle, with virtual pay TV operators YouTube TV and fuboTV also announcing monthly bill bumps. 

The AT&T TV app is once again available in Roku’s Channel Store.

The app, which houses the AT&T TV Now virtual pay TV service, had been unavailable for Roku users to add to their channel portfolios since the beginning of January. (AT&T TV Now subscribers had been able to keep using their Roku devices to access their vMVPD service, provided they had already downloaded the app and didn’t delete it.

The news was first reported by Cord Cutter News. Next TV editors were able to download the AT&T TV channel on Roku. The channel had to be searched for—in other words, it’s not listed as a “featured channel” that automatically surfaces. 

AT&T TV Now finished the first quarter with 788,000 users, less than half of what it peaked with during the summer of 2018, before AT&T pulled its aggressive promotions for the service. The re-inclusion of the AT&T TV app is probably more meaningful in that it signals that AT&T and Roku are engaged in productive negotiations regarding AT&T’s soon-to-launch new direct-to-consumer service, HBO Max. 

Also read: AT&T TV App Ends Support for Roku

Notably, last week, AT&T’s soon-to-be CEO, John Stankey, revealed that HBO Max will probably not launch with app support for Amazon Fire TV. Analysts suspect the complicated negotiation of how HBO Max is integrated into components like Amazon Prime Channels needs to be worked out. 

Also read: AT&T Doesn’t Want Amazon to ‘Disaggregate’ HBO Max into Prime Channels, Analyst Says

But while Stankey was specifically pessimistic about exclusion from the No. 2 OTT device ecosystem in the U.S., AT&T has not locked down the No. 1 ecosystem for HBO Max, either. 

Roku issued this statement last week: “As the #1 streaming platform in the US with over 40 million active accounts that rely upon Roku to access their favorite programs and to discover new content, we are focused on entering into win-win distribution agreements with all new OTT services as part of their launch strategies. While we don’t typically comment on specific deal terms or negotiations, the fact is that in this instance while we believe that HBOMax would benefit greatly from distribution on Roku at launch, we do not currently have an agreement in place.”

AT&T TV, the streaming version of the telecom’s premium full-bundled pay TV service and its long term replacement for DirecTV satellite TV, launched nationally on March 2.

AT&T TV is being positioned as the balm for the wireless giant’s recent pay TV subscriber struggles. AT&T lost another 1.2 million customers across its DirecTV, U-verse and AT&T Now platforms in the fourth quarter alone. It has lost round 5 million satellite and IPTV video customers since 2016. 

“As we move through this year and we start shifting to AT&T TV, our gross add performance starts to get much stronger,” AT&T COO John Stankey told investment analysts during the company’s Q4 earnings call.

Also Read: AT&T TV Launches Nationwide, Telco Begins Phase-out of DirecTV Satellite

Cornerstone Broadband Product

AT&T is indeed bullish on the prospects for AT&T TV, which requires a proprietary Android TV-based set-top box and is delivered over the open internet, but is self-installed and requires no onsite technician support or pricey satellite launches. 

AT&T sees AT&T TV as the cornerstone of its fiber-to-the-home broadband product, which now has 4 million customers. AT&T is hoping to have around 3 million more of them by 2022, and being able to bundle in a premium pay TV service is part of that business equation. 

“Naturally, when you're able to put AT&T TV, a software-based product with fiber, it's a much more natural combination than a satellite dish and fiber. And so, as we start to roll out AT&T TV now in markets and we move in, we're going to see much stronger performance on the fiber side,” Stankey said.

Also Read: AT&T TV Will Make Cratering Pay TV Performance ‘Much Stronger,’ Operator Says

AT&T TV is currently being sold in a handful of markets. In November, AT&T TV was deployed in New York City, Seattle, Minneapolis and Miami. That added to a list of nine “pilot” markets that were initiated in August; Orange and Riverside, California; Topeka, Kan.; Wichita, Kan.; El Paso, Texas; Odessa, Texas; Corpus Christi, Texas; St. Louis; Springfield, Mo.; and West Palm Beach, Fla.

It’s widely assumed that AT&T TV will shove aside AT&T Now, the rebranded version of DirecTV Now virtual MVPD service that was launched with great fanfare in 2016 and grew quickly to nearly 2 million users—some of them paying money!—before AT&T pulled back its aggressive promotional fueling efforts for the service.

Pricing

AT&T TV is starting out with a one-year promotional price of $50 a month, delivering over 70 channels, including ESPN, as well as 500 hours of HD DVR service—an offering that totally undercuts AT&T Now. (AT&T TV’s price shoots up to a very pricey $93 a month after that first year.)

Also Read: AT&T TV to Roll Out in February, Drive Fiber Penetration, Telecom Says

AT&T TV has three very traditional looking tiers, stepping through and to $55- and $65-a-month price tiers (these are first-year prices). All of them allow Google Assistant voice control through an Android TV interface. The full flora and fauna of OTT apps, including Netflix of course, is available through Google Play. Each of the three AT&T TV tiers is offering three months free of HBO, Cinemax, Showtime, Starz and Epix at signup. 

The mid-level “Premium” tier of AT&T TV—which bumps up to $110 month after the $55 first-year price—adds more than 20 additional channels, including Sundance, the Tennis Channel and MLB Network. 

The top-end Xtra tier of AT&T TV, which tops out at $124 a month after a first-year price of $65, adds an additional 20-plus networks over the midlevel Premium tier, including the Golf Channel and National Geographic Wild. 

Notably, in the fine print of the AT&T TV marketing page, a super top-end “Ultimate” tier is also described, priced at $80 for the first year and a whopping $135 a month subsequently. 

Each of the three AT&T TV tiers requires the traditional 24-month contract, meaning users will have to pay handsomely to cancel service early. And not included in the AT&T TV price for the mid-level Choice tier and above is the $8.49-a-month “regional sports fee” subscribers will have to pay. 

Also, the first AT&T TV set-top is free, but adding devices for other rooms is going to tack on a monthly fee.

Again, AT&T TV is packaged more as a traditional pay TV service, with all the requisite gouges, rather than a forward-looking OTT platform. 

After paying nearly $50 billion five years ago to get into the satellite TV business, AT&T is looking to AT&T TV to usher it out of it. We’ll see how it goes. 

“When I look at what's happening from an operational performance perspective and what the team is doing on gross add improvements, what we're seeing in churn improvements, the rollout of AT&T TV that really hits its stride in the second quarter in terms of its availability across the customer base,” Stankey added. "We’ll start to see those subscriber trends incrementally improve as those capabilities start to roll into the base. And we'll get to what I just indicated by the time we exit the year.”

AT&T chief operating officer John Stankey told a virtual industry audience Wednesday that its upcoming subscription streaming service, HBO Max -- set to debut on May 27 -- could eventually be paired with its new IP-based pay TV service, AT&T TV, as the TV business continues to move toward a more compact streaming environment.

“What Max and AT&T TV have in common is they are both software based, independent of any proprietary hardware, allowing customers to get access content over any device, over any hardware platform," Stankey said. 

"They’re low friction, they can be deployed literally by a flick of a computer switch somewhere in a back office," Stankey added. "That’s an important aspect. And that’s what consumers will see as the customer-based Max grows. It becomes a more scaled distribution element within AT&T, certainly something that surpasses 25-28% of households like our pay TV offering. That becomes a lead basis of entertainment and how we get into households.”

Stankey, who will take over for the retiring Randall Stephenson as CEO in July, talked up the HBO Max service at the JP Morgan Technology, Media and Communications conference Wednesday, adding that it is a key part of AT&T’s entertainment strategy.

Stankey said the ultimate vision is to eventually package the software-based AT&T TV and HBO Max together.

Also read: AT&T TV: Everything You Need to Know About the Streaming Version of AT&T’s Premium Pay TV Service

Stankey added that as the TV business continues to transition from the old 500-channel universe to more consolidated, streaming offerings of live sports, scripted and unscripted content and news, bundling the products together seems natural.

“You want a platform that can distribute both. So AT&T being software driven, HBO Max being software driven, user interface capabilities, bundling, price start to move together,” Stankey said. “I think we’re at a very natural place to see that begin to occur and our TV business and our SVOD business start to become one as we get out over the next couple of years.”

Stankey made the declaration after disclosing another bombshell--that HBO Max will probably launch on May 27 without app support for the world's biggest OTT device ecosystem, Amazon Fire TV. 

Also read: AT&T's Stankey: HBO Max Probably Won't Launch with Amazon Fire TV Support

As for AT&T TV, it's supported by all the major OTT hardware. But so far, the new pay TV service--which combines IP delivery with traditional pay TV fee structure--has not reversed AT&T's pay TV subscriber fortunes. 

AT&T chief operating officer John Stankey told a virtual industry audience Wednesday that its latest streaming video offering HBO Max -- set to debut on May 27 -- could eventually be paired with its AT&T TV software based product as the TV business continues to move toward a more compact streaming environment.

Stankey, who will take over for the retiring Randall Stephenson as CEO in July, talked up the HBO Max service at the JP Morgan Technology, Media and Communications conference Wednesday, adding that it is a key part of AT&T’s entertainment strategy.

Stankey said the ultimate vision is to eventually package the software-based AT&T TV and HBO Max together.

“What Max and AT&T TV have in common is they are both software based, independent of any proprietary hardware, allowing customers to get access content over any device, over any hardware platform," Stankey said. "They’re low friction, they can be deployed literally by a flick of a computer switch somewhere in a back office. That’s an important aspect. And that’s what consumers will see as the customer-based Max grows. It becomes a more scaled distribution element within AT&T, certainly something that surpasses 25-28% of households like our pay TV offering. That becomes a lead basis of entertainment and how we get into households.”

Stankey added that as the TV business continues to transition from the old 500-channel universe to more consolidated, streaming offerings of live sports, scripted and unscripted content and news, bundling the products together seems natural.

“You want a platform that can distribute both. So AT&T being software driven, HBO Max being software driven, user interface capabilities, bundling, price start to move together,” Stankey said. “I think we’re at a very natural place to see that begin to occur and our TV business and our SVOD business start to become one as we get out over the next couple of years.”

HBO Max has been aggressively lining up distributors prior to the launch, including Charter Communications, streaming services Hulu, YouTube TV, Apple TV and Android and Google Play platforms.

But Stankey said one key online distributor -- Amazon FireTV -- could be missing from the mix.

“We’re going to be in virtually all app stores, with one exception -- we may not be in the Amazon Fire[TV] app store when all is said and done,” Stankey said at the virtual conference. “We feel really good about the distribution dynamic, the availability of the product. Those that are HBO subscribers immediately move into Max. It ‘s going to be a really strong first day one. I think it’s going to generate a lot of word of mouth socially. It’s going to generate a lot of activity and what we’re doing for promotions attached to AT&T products is going to be beneficial.”

HBO could have some pretty big shoes to fill. The Walt Disney Co. set the streaming app bar high when it launched Disney + in November, attracting more than 10 million downloads on its first day. Disney + currently has about 30 million customers, and projections are for the service to have more than 50 million subscribers by the end of the year.

[embed]https://twitter.com/RichLightShed/status/1260550715967246337[/embed]

On the other end of the spectrum, short-form streaming service Quibi has attracted less than expected interest, with about 2.5 million downloads in its first week. Quibi currently has about 3.5 million customers, and the company has blamed the tepid response to the COVID-19 pandemic.

AT&T has said it expects HBO Max to have about 50 million subscribers by 2025.

Once viewed as “the last line of defense for cable networks” against video cord cutting, virtual MVPD services “imploded” in the first quarter, losing a collective 341,000 users, according to MoffettNathanson analyst Craig Moffett. 

Many of those customer losses belonged to Dish Network’s seminal vMVPD service, Sling TV, which reported the loss of 281,000 users in Q1. AT&T TV Now (formerly DirecTV Now) lost 138,000 customers during the period. Moffett said fuboTV lost users in Q1, as well

Also read: Sling TV in Freefall: 281K Lost Subscribers in Q1

In fact, the analyst said in a report published Friday morning that even Hulu + Live TV, now the market leader and recently the fastest growing of the live-streamed skinny-bundled vMVPD services, has decelerated its growth. With a recent 22% price increase to $54.99, Disney-controlled Hulu + Live TV only added 100,000 users in the first quarter. 

The relatively new vMVPD sector—which kicked off with the launches of Sling TV and Sony PlayStation Vue in early 2015—saw its first casualty in January, when Sony shuttered a Vue service that had accrued an estimated 500,000 users. 

“Their 500,000 subscribers appear to have gone … nowhere,” Moffett wrote.

The entire vMVPD sector is now shrinking at a rate of 5.3% a year. 

“Yes, that too is the worst ever,” the analyst added. 

Nationally deployed in the latter month of the first quarter, AT&T’s new premium IP-based pay TV service, AT&T TV, failed to reverse the steep subscriber losses the telecom company has been experiencing of late across its pay TV platforms.

AT&T, which reported the loss of nearly 900,000 subscribers in Q1 across a “premium” pay TV portfolio that lumps in AT&T TV along with DirecTV and U-verse TV, didn’t break out subscriber metrics for the former.

Also read: AT&T Loses Another 1M Pay TV Subscribers in Q1

However, AT&T CEO Randall Stephenson seemed to imply that uptake for AT&T TV hasn’t been incendiary since the product expanded nationally from limited beta release at the beginning of March.

Visit Next TV to read more stories like this one. 

“Our expectations on AT&T TV have been very consistent with what we have seen even with the suppression of the pandemic in the latter part of March where we were restricted on the certain number of dispatches and some of our capacity there,” Stephenson said, speaking during AT&T’s first-quarter earnings call Wednesday.

Stephenson cited a climate of “suppressed new add activity” in regard to consumers adding new entertainment services, despite the current uptick in video usage.

Also read: AT&T TV: Everything You Need to Know About the Streaming Version of AT&T’s Premium Pay TV Service

“So we feel pretty good about that launch and where we went,” he added. “As you know, we have to ramp that throughout the year, so one month does not a year make. But we are right on the plan of what we expected in terms of volume and the customer feedback on the customers. We have put on the product has been probably stronger than what we expected.”

AT&T is seeking to transition users of its DirecTV and U-verse linear platforms to AT&T TV, an Android TV-based service that's self-install and doesn't require satellite launches. 

AT&T reported the loss of another 1.035 million pay TV subscribers in the first quarter across its myriad video platforms, quashing hopes that the new AT&T TV internet-based platform would reignite customer growth.

The Dallas-based telecom said it lost 897,000 users across its premium pay TV services, grouping the just-launched AT&T TV with DirecTV satellite and U-verse IPTV platforms. AT&T is seeking to transition its premium base to the new AT&T TV platform, which launched at the beginning of March. It’s not selling new U-verse subscriptions and its selling existing U-verse TV and DirecTV subscribers on the notion of switching over to AT&T TV, which is provisioned around cost-efficient customer-install of a proprietary Android TV set-top and requires no satellite support either. 

So how many AT&T TV customers are there a month and a half in? Unclear.

Also read: AT&T TV: Everything You Need to Know About the Streaming Version of AT&T’s Premium Pay TV Service

AT&T now has just 18.58 million remaining pay TV users. It had the biggest pay TV user base in the U.S. when it closed its $50 billion purchase of DirecTV in 2015, serving more than 26 million customers. AT&T has lost around 38% of its pay TV negotiating scale in five years. 

In March, it was reported that AT&T COO John Stankey, who has overseen the company’s video strategy as head of its entertainment group, saw his pay increase by 38% to $22.5 million in 2019. 

Also read: AT&T TV, DirecTV Add Free Year of HBO

But there was more bad news for AT&T’s video business during Wednesday’s Q1 report. 

Notably, AT&T also lost another 138,000 AT&T TV Now virtual MVPD subscribers. Once approaching 2 million users on a promotion-fueled growth ride, AT&T TV Now is down to just 788,000 users.

You can read more about AT&T’s first-quarter earnings report here. 

AT&T continues to fine-tune its video strategy as it seeks to transition the bulk of its pay TV subscriber base to its new internet-delivered premium service, AT&T TV.

AT&T TV and DirecTV subscribers will now have a year of free HBO service when they sign up. The will also receive three free months of Showtime, Starz, Epix and Cinemax.

The offers appear to be separate from AT&T’s #ConnectedTogether campaign, which is currently offering free premium channel content to DirecTV, U-Verse, AT&T TV and AT&T TV Now subscribers.

The telco is also looking to reposition its skinner virtual pay TV service, AT&T TV Now, lowering the price by $10 to $55 a month, but stripping it of its free HBO perk. (The premium channel is now available to new AT&T TV Now subscribers as a $10-a-month add-on.)

Also read: AT&T TV: Everything You Need to Know About the Streaming Version of AT&T’s Premium Pay TV Service

The moves come as the COVID-19 pandemic crisis dampens AT&T’s hopes for a turnaround in its pay TV business, which lost nearly 5 million users last year.

Last week, MoffettNathanson analyst Craig Moffett said that instead of an earlier projection, which called for AT&T’s pay TV base to shrink by 13.1% in 2020 to 16.9 million subscribers, he now believes it will now decline by 16.6% to 16.2 million customers.

Also read: AT&T, DirecTV Set to Be Hit Hard by COVID-19 Recession: Analyst

AT&T last week revealed that it’s no longer adding new customers to its legacy IPTV platform, U-verse. And it’s working to transition much of its DirecTV customer base to AT&T TV.

“That would have been a difficult transition under the best of circumstances. These aren’t the best of circumstances,” Moffett said. 

AT&T continues to fine-tune its video strategy as it seeks to transition the bulk of its pay TV subscriber base to its new internet-delivered premium service, AT&T TV.

AT&T TV subscribers will now have a year of free HBO service when they sign up. The will also receive three free months of Showtime, Starz, Epix and Cinemax. 

Update: New DirecTV sign-ups have also been offered a free year of HBO. 

The offers appear to be separate from AT&T’s #ConnectedTogether campaign, which is currently offering free premium channel content to DirecTV, U-Verse, AT&T TV and AT&T TV Now subscribers.

The telco is also looking to reposition its skinner virtual pay TV service, AT&T TV Now, lowering the price by $10 to $55 a month, but stripping it of its free HBO perk. (The premium channel is now available to new AT&T TV Now subscribers as a $10-a-month add-on.)

Also read: AT&T TV: Everything You Need to Know About the Streaming Version of AT&T’s Premium Pay TV Service

The moves come as the COVID-19 pandemic crisis dampens AT&T’s hopes for a turnaround in its pay TV business, which lost nearly 5 million users last year. 

Last week, MoffettNathanson analyst Craig Moffett said that instead of an earlier projection, which called for AT&T’s pay TV base to shrink by 13.1% in 2020 to 16.9 million subscribers, he now believes it will now decline by 16.6% to 16.2 million customers. 

Also read: AT&T, DirecTV Set to Be Hit Hard by COVID-19 Recession: Analyst

AT&T last week revealed that it’s no longer adding new customers to its legacy IPTV platform, U-verse. And it’s working to transition much of its DirecTV customer base to AT&T TV.

“That would have been a difficult transition under the best of circumstances. These aren’t the best of circumstances,” Moffett said.  

After losing nearly 5 million pay TV subscribers across their various platforms in 2019, AT&T executives had told investors that cord cutting should start to decelerate this year amid the launch of the company’s new IP-based video platform, AT&T TV.

But the COVID-10 pandemic, and the related economic recession, will likely disrupt those plans and place AT&T’s pay TV business on an even more accelerated path of degeneration, said MoffettNathanson analyst Craig Moffett.

Related: AT&T Stops Selling U-verse TV

Moffett said that instead of an earlier prediction, which called for AT&T’s pay TV base to shrink by 13.1% in 2020 to 16.9 million subscribers, he believes it will now decline by 16.6% to 16.2 million customers.

Related: AT&T Stock Rises After Loan Deal

For starters, Moffett said economic recession will likely accelerate cord cutting for all providers, with subscribers under pressure to reduce household costs they deem non-essential.

In the more immediate term, however, the loss of live sports amid the pandemic will obliterate the pay TV market’s major linchpin. And no platform is more exposed than AT&T’s DirecTV satellite service, which is built around a robust portfolio of regional sports networks and expensive live-sports assets, like NFL Sunday Ticket.

Also read: AT&T TV: Everything You Need to Know About the Streaming Version of AT&T’s Premium Pay TV Service

Despite losing nearly 3.2 million customers last year, DirecTV is still AT&T’s biggest pay TV asset, with more than 16 million subscribers. AT&T has stopped promoting DirecTV, and is no longer coining new subscribers for its other linear pay TV platform, U-verse TV, as it tries to transition its pay TV base to its new IP-based platform, AT&T Now. As Moffett noted in his missive to investors sent April 3: “That would have been a difficult transition under the best of circumstances. These aren’t the best of circumstances.”

Speaking to investors during AT&T’s fourth-quarter earnings call, COO John Stankey said, “As we move through this year and we start shifting to AT&T TV, our gross add performance starts to get much stronger.”

After losing nearly 5 million pay TV subscribers across their various platforms in 2019, AT&T executives had told investors that cord cutting should start to decelerate this year amid the launch of the company’s new IP-based video platform, AT&T TV.

But the COVID-10 pandemic, and the related economic recession, will likely disrupt those plans and place AT&T’s pay TV business on an even more accelerated path of degeneration, said MoffettNathanson analyst Craig Moffett

Also read: AT&T Stops Selling U-verse TV

Moffett predicts that instead of an earlier prediction, which called for AT&T’s pay TV base to shrink by 13.1% in 2020 to 16.9 million subscribers, he believes it will now decline by 16.6% to 16.2 million customers. 

For starters, Moffett said economic recession will likely accelerate cord cutting for all providers, with subscribers under pressure to reduce household costs they deem non-essential.

In the more immediate term, however, the loss of live sports amid the pandemic will obliterate the pay TV market’s major lynchpin. And no platform is more exposed than AT&T’s DirecTV satellite service, which is built around a robust portfolio of regional sports networks and expensive live-sports assets, like NFL Sunday Ticket. 

Also read: AT&T TV: Everything You Need to Know About the Streaming Version of AT&T’s Premium Pay TV Service

Despite losing nearly 3.2 million customers last year, DirecTV is still AT&T’s biggest pay TV asset, with more than 16 million subscribers. AT&T has stopped promoting DirecTV, and is not longer coining new subscribers for its other linear pay TV platform, U-verse TV, as it tries to transition its pay TV base to its new IP-based platform, AT&T Now. As Moffett noted in his missive to investors sent April 3. “That would have been a difficult transition under the best of circumstances. These aren’t the best of circumstances.” 

Speaking to investors during AT&T’s fourth-quarter earnings call, COO John Stankey said, “As we move through this year and we start shifting to AT&T TV, our gross add performance starts to get much stronger.”

Well, as the hacks like to say, it’s official—AT&T has stopped selling its 14-year-old IPTV pay TV platform, U-verse TV.

“Current U-verse TV customers will continue to experience the same great service, however new U-verse TV packages can no longer be purchased,” AT&T said on its U-verse page. (Tip of ol’ ball cap to analyst Phillip Swann, aka the TV Answer Man, for catching this first.)

That page is now primarily devoted to selling AT&T TV, the recently launched internet-based pay TV service. But U-verse TV, which was originally part of an initiative dubbed “Project Lightspeed" and launched in 2006 as part of an aggressive AT&T fiber buildout, has been marginalized for a while now.

U-verse TV ended 2019 with 3.44 million subscribers, down 264,000 year over year. But the figure is slightly more than half of the 6 million subscribers U-verse TV had at the beginning of 2015, before AT&T consummated its $50 billion takeover of DirecTV and began prioritizing its satellite TV brand.

Related: AT&T TV: Everything You Need to Know About the Streaming Version of AT&T’s Premium Pay TV Service

Can we expect a similar cease and desist for sales of other legacy AT&T pay TV platforms? AT&T TV Now, the virtual MVPD formally branded DirecTV Now, is undercut in price by AT&T TV, at least in the first promotional year of the new premium service, with the vMVPD charging more money for fewer channels.

But unlike AT&T TV, the vMVPD has no contract, and it can be signed up for and quit immediately. This ostensibly leaves a market available to AT&T TV Now, which is based on the same technology platform as AT&T TV.

As for DirecTV satellite, AT&T executives say there is still a market for satellite TV in harder to reach rural markets. 

Well, as the hacks like to say, it’s official—AT&T has stopped selling its 14-year-old IPTV pay TV platform, U-verse TV.

“Current U-verse TV customers will continue to experience the same great service, however new U-verse TV packages can no longer be purchased,” AT&T said on its U-verse page. 

That page is now primarily devoted to selling AT&T TV, the recently launched internet-based pay TV service. But U-verse TV, which was originally part of an initiative dubbed “Project Lightspeed" and launched in 2006 as part of an aggressive AT&T fiber buildout, has been marginalized for a while now. 

U-verse TV ended 2019 with 3.44 million subscribers, down 264,000 year over year. But the figure is slightly more than half of the 6 million subscribers U-verse TV had at the beginning of 2015, before AT&T consummated its $50 billion takeover of DirecTV and began prioritizing its satellite TV brand. 

Also read: AT&T TV: Everything You Need to Know About the Streaming Version of AT&T’s Premium Pay TV Service

Can we expect a similar cease and desist for sales of other legacy AT&T pay TV platforms? AT&T TV Now, the virtual MVPD formally branded DirecTV Now, is undercut in price by AT&T TV, at least in the first promotional year of the new premium service, with the vMVPD charging more money for fewer channels. 

But unlike AT&T TV, the vMVPD has no contract, and it can be signed up for and quit immediately. This ostensibly leaves a market available to AT&T TV Now, which is based on the same technology platform as AT&T TV.

As for DirecTV satellite, AT&T executives say there is still a market for satellite TV in harder to reach rural markets. 

AT&T said it is giving subscribers to its pay-TV services free access to premium channels including Starz, Epix and its own HBO and Cinemax for a limited time.

The company is also launching a new ad campaign that uses the hashtag #ConnectedTogether to show how with people practicing social distancing to slow the spread of the Coronavirus, AT&T’s people and technology are helping to bring people together.

The company, one of the nation’s largest advertisers, said it is replacing its current advertising with spots that deliver its message about the importance of connectivity during times of fear and division.

The first of the new spots show families getting together via video chat and workers connecting cables and working in control rooms.

AT&T said that effective Thursday it will begin offering free premium channel content to DirecTV, U-Verse, AT&T TV and AT&T TV Now subscribers. The offer starts Thursday with Starz (only to DirecTV and U-Verse subscribers). On March 2, subscribers will get Epix through April 16. On April 16 through April 20, they’ll get HBO and Cinemax.

It may be delivered over the open internet. And it may be powered by Google software. But AT&T’s new pay TV service, AT&T TV, is as traditional as it gets when it comes to the fine print. 

After receiving an AT&T TV brochure last week at Next TV’s Los Angeles office, we broke out ol’ magnifying glass to examine some of the caveats. 

The brochure prominently advertises a first-year promotional price of $79.98 a month for AT&T TV and AT&T Fiber (1 Gbps), with fine print adding taxes and a $10-a-month “equipment fee” for the gateway. AT&T is throwing in a $200 Visa reward card for “qualifying” AT&T TV signups. 

Also read: AT&T TV: Everything You Need to Know About the Streaming Version of AT&T’s Premium Pay TV Service

For those unfamiliar with AT&T TV, the service will ultimately replace DirecTV satellite, U-verse IPTV and AT&T Now vMVPD platforms, offering a service based on Android TV and its accoutrements (all the apps available in the Google Play Store, plus voice control via Google Assistant). There’s not satellite dish or truck roll required to establish service, but there is a proprietary set-top.

Also read: AT&T TV Launches Nationwide as Telco Begins Phase-out of DirecTV Satellite

Our AT&T TV brochure touts “live TV & sports, On Demand, Cloud DVR and access to HBO, Netflix, Pandora and more!” It doesn’t say how many channels specifically are in the bundle. 

So what’s in the fine print?

> There’s a $19.99 charge for “activation.” 

> Terminating the AT&T TV service early in the 24-month commitment will trigger a charge of $15 per month left on the contract. 

> There’s a $10 discount for bundling AT&T TV with AT&T fiber internet, and the discount kicks in “within three months” of signing up for service. Until that discount kicks in, subscribers will pay $99.98 for the double-play service, plus tax. That includes not only the $10-a-month that’s not yet been discounted, but the $10-a-month “internet equipment fee.”

> AT&T recommends a minimum internet connection speed of 8 Mbps for AT&T TV and subscribing households are limited to three concurrent streams. 

> After 12 months, the price of the double play will increase to $152.99 a month; the AT&T TV service will be priced at $93 a month and 1-gig internet priced at $59.99 a month. 

> AT&T TV subscribers get one Android TV-powered set-top as part of their advertised monthly service price. Additional set-tops can be purchased for “$120 each for on installment.” 

> If you cancel the service within the first 14 days, you must return the AT&T TV set-top in order to avoid a $120 “non-return fee.” 

> There are no credits for any “partial-month periods or unwatched content.”

> “Pricing, channels, features and terms [are] subject to change & may be modified or discounted at any time without notice.”

We meant to do that.

That was one of the essential takeaways AT&T president and chief operating officer John Stankey had for investors as to why the telco was displacing DirecTV with a streaming pay TV service just five years after paying $50 billion for the satellite-TV company.

“I think, back in July of 2015, after we closed the DirecTV transaction, we were pretty clear that at that point in time we didn’t see satellite delivery as necessarily a growth vehicle for entertainment moving forward,” Stankey said March 3 at a Morgan Stanley investor event. “We like the DirecTV customer base — we thought it was attractive. But we felt like the march needed to be to delivering entertainment over software.”

Launching nationwide after tests in 13 markets, AT&T TV is a kind of hybrid, matching over-the-top and traditional pay TV services. It’s delivered over the open internet to a proprietary Android TV set-top box, which means AT&T doesn’t have to launch satellites to support the service. It’s self-installed, so the operational costs of truck rolls are also factored out of the equation.

The Android TV-based system includes access to Netflix, YouTube and virtually every other OTT app through the Google Play digital store, so AT&T doesn’t have to worry about developing native platform integrations of SVOD services. Voice integration is also handled natively, through Google Assistant.

Conversely, AT&T TV is as much “traditional pay TV” as it is OTT. There’s a two-year contract involved, with a full bundle of around 70 channels in the base tier — including the Big Four broadcast networks and ESPN — priced at $50 a month in the first year before shooting up to $93 for the second 12 months. There are hidden fees, notably an $8.49-per-month regional sports network charge, and additional costs for adding more Android TV set-tops. And there are charges for early cancellation.

Stankey didn’t disclose how many customers AT&T TV has at this point, but said “we’re really pleased with what we saw” on the service’s March 2 nationwide launch day. With AT&T losing 4.1 million subscribers in 2019 across its incumbent pay TV services — DirecTV satellite, U-verse TV managed IPTV and the erstwhile DirecTV Now virtual MVPD service (now confusingly called AT&T TV Now) — AT&T expects its new video platform will reverse its currently high customer-churn trajectory in 2020.

AT&T TV is also seen as the cornerstone of the telco’s fiber-to-the-home broadband sales effort, now in 4 million homes. AT&T is hoping to have around 3 million more of them by 2022, and being able to bundle in a premium pay TV service is part of that business equation.

“We’re getting higher attach rates than what we would traditionally get in selling broadband with satellite,” Stankey said. “We saw higher growth rates than what we would typically see, and I think that’s driven by the fact that the product is an updated, more feature-rich product. And of course, the fact that we can now bundle it more attractively in certain areas, such as our fiber footprint and offer very, very attractive bundles on it, customers are aware of that and are interested to try and kick the tires on it.”

DirecTV Finds ‘Rightful Place’

With the introduction of AT&T TV, the telco’s existing pay TV services are either being marginalized or put out to pasture.

Stankey didn’t comment on U-verse TV, the 14-year-old IPTV service that ended the fourth quarter with only around 3.4 million remaining subscribers. News site Cord Cutters reported that AT&T is no longer promoting U-verse TV on the internet.

Likewise, Stankey only passingly addressed AT&T TV Now, the skinny-bundled vMVPD that had a promotion-fueled rocket ride to nearly 2 million subscribers in its first 20 months in the market, before AT&T turned off the loss-leader taps. But priced at $65 a month for 45-plus channels, AT&T TV Now would seem to be undercut and antiquated by AT&T TV, even though it is free of contracts and early-termination charges. Stankey described the vMVPD as merely an “iteration,” a technological step on the way to AT&T TV.

”We will continue to offer satellite and DirecTV where it has a rightful place in the market, places where cable broadband is not as prevalent.” — John Stankey, president and COO, AT&T

That leaves DirecTV, which has seen a base of more than 21 million subscribers whittle away to just more than 16 million as of the end of the fourth quarter. DirecTV also recently saw the departure of senior VP and chief content officer Dan York, culminating a series of top-level executive departures for the satellite-TV service that began when former DirecTV CEO Mike White left its El Segundo, California, headquarters when AT&T closed its $50 billion acquisition in summer 2015. Now, AT&T isn’t even branding its flagship pay TV service with the DirecTV name anymore.

“We will continue to offer satellite and DirecTV where it has a rightful place in the market, places where cable broadband is not as prevalent,” Stankey said.

Despite investor pleas for AT&T to divest the satellite TV asset, Stankey reiterated the telco’s position that it’s not likely to do that soon.

“I would tell you we don’t see it really running in the regulatory environment,” he said. “And I would also say, you have to be a little circumspect as an executive right now. If you're doing anything that requires approval, my read of the environment is, it’s a little unpredictable.”

AT&T just started on Monday rolling out nationally its new pay TV service, AT&T TV, which combines streaming over the open internet with the contractual, hidden-fee elements of a traditional bundled video package.

Speaking to investors Wednesday at a Morgan Stanley investor conference, AT&T President and COO John Stankey laid out AT&T’s new pay TV strategy, in which incumbent services DirecTV satellite, U-verse managed IPTV and AT&T TV Now virtual MVPD services are all marginalized.

Also read: AT&T TV: Everything You Need to Know About the Streaming Version of AT&T’s Premium Pay TV Service

Stankey said that even though AT&T paid $50 billion as recently as 2015 to buy DirecTV, it always knew the asset would be obsolete in five years.

Visit Next TV to read more stories like this one. 

“I think, back in July of 2015, after we closed the DirecTV transaction, we were pretty clear and said that at that point in time that we didn't see satellite delivery as necessarily a growth vehicle for entertainment moving forward,” Stankey told investors. “We like the DirecTV customer base, thought it was attractive. But we felt like the march needed to be to delivering entertainment over software.”

A Rightful Place in the Market

Stankey said that going forward, DirecTV will only be marketed to customers on a situational basis.

“We will continue to offer satellite and DirecTV where it has a rightful place in the market, places where cable broadband is not prevalent, oftentimes, more rural or less dense suburban areas,” Stankey said. “We'll continue to offer it for customers on a stand-alone basis, who find its superior content offering to be something that they wish to have. But in terms of our marketing muscle and our momentum in the market, it will be about software-driven pay TV packages either over bring your own hardware, which is AT&T TV.”

Stankey didn’t discuss U-verse, AT&T’s managed IPTV service. However, news site Cord Cutters reported the telco confirmed that U-verse is no longer being marketed online.

As for the erstwhile DirecTV Now, the skinny-bundled virtual pay TV service launched back in 2016 and now confusingly monikered as “AT&T TV Now,” Stankey said it was merely an “iteration” on the path to AT&T TV.

AT&T TV is a full-bundled traditional pay TV service being sold on a two-year contract basis, its base package discounted to $40 a month in the first year. The base price balloons to $93 for the second year, and there are hidden fees, including regional sports network and extra set-top dings.

The service streams to a proprietary Android TV-powered set-top, giving customers access to the full flora and fauna of the Google Play store, as well as the voice capabilities of Google Assistant. The service is self-install, meaning not only is AT&T off the hook for satellite launches, it also doesn’t have to worry about truck rolls anymore.

AT&T TV had already been deployed in 13 states under trial run. Stankey didn’t disclose how many customers the service had, only that the telco “was really pleased with what we saw yesterday.”

AT&T lost more than 4 million users in 2019 across DirecTV, U-verse and AT&T TV Now. It expects AT&T TV to reverse those customer growth fortunes, as well as offer it something sticky to bundle fiber broadband with.

“We're getting higher attach rates than what we would traditionally get in selling broadband with satellite,” Stankey said. “We saw higher growth rates than what we would typically see, and I think that's driven by the fact that the product is an updated, more feature-rich product. And of course, the fact that we can now bundle it more attractively in certain areas, such as our fiber footprint and offer very, very attractive bundles on it—customers are aware of that and are interested to try and kick the tires on it. So feel good about what the team was able to do over this period of time and bring it forward.”

AT&T just started on Monday rolling out nationally its new pay TV service, AT&T TV, which combines streaming over the open internet with the contractual, hidden-fee elements of a traditional bundled video package.

Speaking to investors Wednesday at a Morgan Stanley investor conference, AT&T President and COO John Stankey laid out AT&T’s new pay TV strategy, in which incumbent services DirecTV satellite, U-verse managed IPTV and AT&T TV Now virtual MVPD services are all marginalized. 

Also read: AT&T TV: Everything You Need to Know About the Streaming Version of AT&T’s Premium Pay TV Service

Stankey said that even though AT&T paid $50 billion as recently as 2015 to buy DirecTV, it always knew the asset would be obsolete in five years. 

“I think, back in July of 2015, after we closed the DirecTV transaction, we were pretty clear and said that at that point in time that we didn't see satellite delivery as necessarily a growth vehicle for entertainment moving forward,” Stankey told investors. “We like the DirecTV customer base, thought it was attractive. But we felt like the march needed to be to delivering entertainment over software.”

A Rightful Place in the Market

Stankey said that going forward, DirecTV will only be marketed to customers on a situational basis. 

“We will continue to offer satellite and DirecTV where it has a rightful place in the market, places where cable broadband is not prevalent, oftentimes, more rural or less dense suburban areas,” Stankey said. “We'll continue to offer it for customers on a stand-alone basis, who find its superior content offering to be something that they wish to have. But in terms of our marketing muscle and our momentum in the market, it will be about software-driven pay TV packages either over bring your own hardware, which is AT&T TV.”

Stankey didn’t discuss U-verse, AT&T’s managed IPTV service. However, news site Cord Cutters reported the telco confirmed that U-verse is no longer being marketed online. 

As for the erstwhile DirecTV Now, the skinny-bundled virtual pay TV service launched back in 2016 and now confusingly monikered as “AT&T TV Now,” Stankey said it was merely an “iteration” on the path to AT&T TV. 

AT&T TV is a full-bundled traditional pay TV service being sold on a two-year contract basis, its base package discounted to $40 a month in the first year. The base price balloons to $93 for the second year, and there are hidden fees, including regional sports network and extra set-top dings. 

The service streams to a proprietary Android TV-powered set-top, giving customers access to the full flora and fauna of the Google Play store, as well as the voice capabilities of Google Assistant. The service is self-install, meaning not only is AT&T off the hook for satellite launches, it also doesn’t have to worry about truck rolls anymore. 

AT&T TV had already been deployed in 13 states under trial run. Stankey didn’t disclose how many customers the service had, only that the telco “was really pleased with what we saw yesterday.”

AT&T lost more than 4 million users  in 2019 across DirecTV, U-verse and AT&T TV Now. It expects AT&T TV to reverse those customer growth fortunes, as well as offer it something sticky to bundle fiber broadband with. 

“We're getting higher attach rates than what we would traditionally get in selling broadband with satellite,” Stankey said. “We saw higher growth rates than what we would typically see, and I think that's driven by the fact that the product is an updated, more feature-rich product. And of course, the fact that we can now bundle it more attractively in certain areas, such as our fiber footprint and offer very, very attractive bundles on it—customers are aware of that and are interested to try and kick the tires on it. So feel good about what the team was able to do over this period of time and bring it forward.”

AT&T TV, the streaming version of traditional pay TV, is now available nationwide after launching into 13 test markets over last summer and fall.

AT&T said it is bundling the new video service with fiber internet for $80 a month for the first year—$40 each for broadband and TV.

Also read: AT&T TV: Everything You Need to Know About the Streaming Version of AT&T’s Premium Pay TV Service

The deal requires a two-year contract and shoots up massively in the 13 month—to $93 a month for video service alone. There’s also fees involved for things ranging from regional sports networks to leasing additional set-tops.

Visit Next TV to read more stories like this one. 

These very traditional-sounding telecom restrictions are juxtaposed against very OTT elements to the service. AT&T TV is build around a proprietary Android TV-based set-top, which provides full access to all the apps available in the Google Play Store, not to mention Google Assistant voice and home-automation support.

The service, which ships with one proprietary set-top, also includes 500 hours of DVR storage.

AT&T, which lost more than 4 million pay TV customers in 2019 across DirecTV satellite, U-verse and virtual MVPD AT&T TV Now, believes AT&T TV will stem its subscriber losses, while boosting its fiber internet sales.

The launch of the service displaces AT&T TV Now, which charges more for fewer channels in its current iteration. It would also seem to render DirecTV satellite something AT&T might consider divesting.

AT&T also believes the service will drive down operational costs for pay TV—AT&T TV requires now satellite launches. And it’s customer installed, so there’s no truck rolls involved.

"Our customers told us what they want from their TV service and we built AT&T TV around that,” said Thaddeus Arroyo, CEO of AT&T Consumer, in a statement. “AT&T TV is live TV made easy and when you add AT&T TV to our amazing 1 gigabit AT&T Internet you can’t go wrong.”

AT&T TV, the streaming version of traditional pay TV, is now available nationwide after launching into 13 test markets over last summer and fall.

AT&T said it is bundling the new video service with fiber internet for $80 a month for the first year—$40 each for broadband and TV.

Also read: AT&T TV: Everything You Need to Know About the Streaming Version of AT&T’s Premium Pay TV Service

The deal requires a two-year contract and shoots up massively in the 13 month—to $93 a month for video service alone. There’s also fees involved for things ranging from regional sports networks to leasing additional set-tops. 

These very traditional-sounding telecom restrictions are juxtaposed against very OTT elements to the service. AT&T TV is build around a proprietary Android TV-based set-top, which provides full access to all the apps available in the Google Play Store, not to mention Google Assistant voice and home-automation support. 

The service, which ships with one proprietary set-top, also includes 500 hours of DVR storage. 

AT&T, which lost more than 4 million pay TV customers in 2019 across DirecTV satellite, U-verse and virtual MVPD AT&T TV Now, believes AT&T TV will stem its subscriber losses, while boosting its fiber internet sales. 

The launch of the service displaces AT&T TV Now, which charges more for fewer channels in its current iteration. It would also seem to render DirecTV satellite something AT&T might consider divesting. 

AT&T also believes the service will drive down operational costs for pay TV—AT&T TV requires now satellite launches. And it’s customer installed, so there’s no truck rolls involved. 

"Our customers told us what they want from their TV service and we built AT&T TV around that,” said Thaddeus Arroyo, CEO of AT&T Consumer, in a statement. “AT&T TV is live TV made easy and when you add AT&T TV to our amazing 1 gigabit AT&T Internet you can’t go wrong.”

AT&T’s strategy built around its $49 billion acquisition of satellite TV service DirecTV in 2015 clearly hit the rocks in the fourth quarter, with No. 2 U.S. pay TV company losing nearly 1.2 million subscribers across DirecTV, U-verse and virtual MVPD AT&T Now. 

For its part, AT&T hopes that’s rock bottom. 

The company said in its fourth-quarter earnings report today that it hopes the introduction of “software-based” video services, AT&T TV and HBO Max, will be natural complements to a sales push of fiber-to-the-home (FTTH) services and reverse the company’s failing video fortunes. 

Launching nationally in February, AT&T TV is a premium, self-installed, full-bundle pay TV service delivered over the open internet to proprietary Android-TV set-top boxes. 

“As we move through this year and we start shifting to AT&T TV, our gross add performance starts to get much stronger,” AT&T COO John Stankey told investment analyst today. “And naturally, when you're able to put AT&T TV, a software-based product with fiber, it's a much more natural combination than a satellite dish and fiber. And so, as we start to roll out AT&T TV now in markets and we move in, we're going to see much stronger performance on the fiber side.

“When I look at what's happening from an operational performance perspective and what the team is doing on gross add improvements, what we're seeing in churn improvements, the rollout of AT&T TV that really hits its stride in the second quarter in terms of its availability across the customer base,” Stankey added. "We’ll start to see those subscriber trends incrementally improve as those capabilities start to roll into the base. And we'll get to what I just indicated by the time we exit the year."

AT&T said it currently has around 4 million FTTH customers, but it expects to add around 3 million more by 2022. 

“This will be a significant lift in market share compared to our traditional performance in our legacy hybrid fiber copper-based footprint,” said AT&T CEO Randall Stephenson, also speaking today during the Q4 earnings call. 

HBO Max, a subscription video on demand (SVOD) service being launched in April, is another software-based service that synergies well with the fiber push, AT&T executives said.

With AT&T and its WarnerMedia unit opting to hold back content assets like hit comedy series The Big Bang Theory for HBO Max, instead of licensing them out for immediate licensing cash, current revenue generation has been constrained, AT&T executives admitted today. WarnerMedia posted a 9.5% drop in fourth-quarter operating income to $2.4 billion, largely as a result of investments in HBO Max and the foregone licensing opportunities.

Still, AT&T execs expressed bullishness on HBO Max’s prospects … and a willingness to invest even more into the enterprise. 

“It's a product that's going to continue to grow over the coming years,” Stankey said. “And we're going to be looking in the market for opportunities for other content acquisition and the like. And it's entirely possible, we may be opportunistic, or look at something, and we want the management team to have that flexibility to be able to balance those things out. We have subscriber growth coming and things are working well with our strategies. We make it a little heavier on trying to build up subscribers and what we expected.”

AT&T told customers today that the AT&T TV app is no longer available on Roku devices, effectively ending app support for virtual MVPD AT&T Now on the top OTT device ecosystem.

According to an AT&T customer support page, discovered by Cord Cutter News, the app became unavailable on Roku boxes, streaming sticks and enabled smart TVs yesterday, January 1.

“Already have AT&T TV on your Roku device? You can keep using it as long as you don't delete the app. We're actively working on a new agreement with Roku and hope to resolve this soon,” the support page said.

AT&T TV supports AT&T Now, the vMVPD AT&T is quietly shoving aside to make room for the confusingly monikered AT&T TV, the live-streamed version of AT&T’s premium pay TV service.

AT&T TV is currently in beta and set to roll out nationwide in February, and the new service doesn’t have much need for living-room based OTT devices. Rather, AT&T TV requires a proprietary Android TV-powered set-top, rendering app-based viewing to iOS and Android mobile devices.

But this is certainly a major nail in the coffin for AT&T Now (formerly DirecTV Now), which was on the way to becoming the top virtual MVPD before AT&T suddenly stopped its aggressive loss-leader promotional support for the service in late 2018.

According to Strategy Analytics data released over the summer, Roku is the No. 1 OTT device ecosystem in the U.S., accounting for 15.2% of connected TVs.

AT&T told customers today that the AT&T TV app is no longer available on Roku devices, effectively ending app support for virtual MVPD AT&T Now on the top OTT device ecosystem.

According to an AT&T customer support page, discovered by Cord Cutter News, the app became unavailable on Roku boxes, streaming sticks and enabled smart TVs yesterday, Jan. 1. 

“Already have AT&T TV on your Roku device? You can keep using it as long as you don't delete the app. We're actively working on a new agreement with Roku and hope to resolve this soon,” the support page said. 

AT&T TV supports AT&T Now, the vMVPD AT&T is quietly shoving aside to make room for the confusingly monikered AT&T TV, the live-streamed version of AT&T’s premium pay TV service. 

AT&T TV is currently in beta and set to roll out nationwide in February, and the new service doesn’t have much need for living-room based OTT devices. Rather, AT&T TV requires a proprietary Android TV-powered set-top, rendering app-based viewing to iOS and Android mobile devices.  

But this is certainly a major nail in the coffin for AT&T Now (formerly DirecTV Now), which was on the way to becoming the top virtual MVPD before AT&T suddenly stopped its aggressive loss-leader promotional support for the service in late 2018. 

According to Strategy Analytics data released over the summer, Roku is the No. 1 OTT device ecosystem in the U.S., accounting for 15.2% of connected TVs.

AT&T has set an ambitious agenda to gain 50% market share within three years in the regions where it has launched fiber-to-the-home (FTTH) service.

“We have proof of how we do this historically,” Jeffrey McElfresh, CEO AT&T Communications, said at the Barclays Global Technology, Media and Telecommunications Broker Conference. “As you look at the fiber that we built out in the ground in 2016, at the three-year mark, we roughly approach about a 50% share gain in that territory. And so for 2020, with the bulk of our investments behind us in this fiber plan, our tactics are to drive penetration with the fiber that we’ve built.”

Despite AT&T’s having lost 123,000 wireline broadband customers in the third quarter, McElfresh said “the economic performance of our broadband business is very strong, setting aside subscriber losses in the lower speed DSL segment in the copper network.”

In markets where AT&T faces off against Comcast, Charter Communications and other cable broadband providers, “where we have fiber, we win and win handily,” he added. In a June 4 note to investors, MoffettNathanson analyst Craig Moffett said that AT&T had gained 1.1 million FTTH customers in the previous year, bringing its base at the time to 3.1 million subscribers, an impressive 57% annual growth rate.

“But from whom are these market share gains coming?” Moffett asked. “The short answer appears to be …. from AT&T itself.”

Indeed, rather than poaching customers from cable operators, AT&T has largely been upgrading existing DSL and U-verse users.

In any event, the No. 2 U.S. wireless operator appears to be charging forward with the strategy. It plans to bundle its new premium virtual pay TV service, AT&T TV, to drive FTTH growth.

At the Barclays conference, McElfresh said AT&T TV — which has been soft-launched in New York and a dozen other markets — will roll out nationally in February. That livestreamed service, which comes with a two-year contract, requires no truck rolls or satellite launches and requires half the capital spending of DirecTV satellite TV.

“Our growth agenda is on fiber and our entertainment group, and on the AT&T TV product that will be offered nationwide,” McElfresh said.

AT&T said the virtual version of its premium pay TV service, AT&T TV, will roll out nationwide starting in February, and that it will be used to drive penetration of the telecom’s fiber-to-the-home broadband service. 

Speaking earlier this week at the Barclays Global Technology, Media and Telecommunications Broker Conference, Jeffery McElfresh, CEO AT&T Communications, described AT&T Now as a “capex-light” product that generates half the customer acquisition cost of AT&T’s DirecTV satellite TV service. (A transcript of the event was provided by Seeking Alpha.)

Having lost 1.3 million pay TV customers across its various platforms in the third quarter alone, AT&T expects its new virtualized premium video service—which has already entered the market  in New York and a dozen other cities—to stem subscriber churn. 

Meanwhile, AT&T is shooting for 50% market share in wireline broadband, over the next three years, within the regions it has launched its FTTH service. 

“Our growth agenda is on fiber and our entertainment group, and on the AT&T TV product that will be offered nationwide,” McElfresh said. “We'll grow with a better capex payback profile in our pay TV business with AT&T TV, coupled with a focus on our fiber broadband footprint driving incremental penetration, and that's how we balance out our entertainment group's performance in 2020 and beyond.”

AT&T TV is a streaming pay TV service that hybridizes newer virtual and traditional linear business models. In regard to the latter, the service requires a two-year contract, bundling in 73 channels in its base tier for $60 a month the first year, the price shooting up to $93 a month in year two. It also comes with a proprietary set-top, an Android TV-powered client device.

On the vMVPD side, the service is self-installed, thus generating AT&T’s projected capital expenditures savings. And it’s delivered over the open internet and not managed network, allowing customers to use any broadband service they want. 

Of course, AT&T is hoping they choose its FTTH service. And for his part, McElfresh believes the new video service can help AT&T achieve its “50% penetration” goal for fiber. 

“We have proof of how we do this historically,” he said. “As you look at the fiber that we built out in the ground in 2016, at the three-year mark, we roughly approach about a 50% share gain in that territory. And so for 2020, with the bulk of our investments behind us in this fiber plan, our tactics are to drive penetration with the fiber that we've built.”

AT&T’s bundling strategy will also include upcoming SVOD service HBO Max, as well as its legacy DirecTV satellite product. And in addition to fiber, the telecom will also be pushing 5G fixed wireless services, in regions where that makes sense. 

“You'll see lead product offers that are the best products that we can offer from wireless, fiber and AT&T TV and HBO Max in geographies where we offer the best infrastructure-based broadband,” McElfresh said. “In parts of the territory where there is no broadband available, you'll see us lead with our satellite legacy pay TV product and wireless.”

AT&T said the virtual version of its premium pay TV service, AT&T TV, will roll out nationwide starting in February, and that it will be used to drive penetration of the telecom’s fiber-to-the-home broadband service.

Speaking earlier this week at the Barclays Global Technology, Media and Telecommunications Broker Conference, Jeffery McElfresh, CEO AT&T Communications, described AT&T Now as a “capex-light” product that generates half the customer acquisition cost of AT&T’s DirecTV satellite TV service. (A transcript of the event was provided by Seeking Alpha.)

Having lost 1.3 million pay TV customers across its various platforms in the third quarter alone, AT&T expects its new virtualized premium video service—which has already entered the market in New York and a dozen other cities—to stem subscriber churn.

Meanwhile, AT&T is shooting for 50% market share in wireline broadband, over the next three years, within the regions it has launched its FTTH service.

“Our growth agenda is on fiber and our entertainment group, and on the AT&T TV product that will be offered nationwide,” McElfresh said. “We'll grow with a better capex payback profile in our pay TV business with AT&T TV, coupled with a focus on our fiber broadband footprint driving incremental penetration, and that's how we balance out our entertainment group's performance in 2020 and beyond.”

AT&T TV is a streaming pay TV service that hybridizes newer virtual and traditional linear business models. In regard to the latter, the service requires a two-year contract, bundling in 73 channels in its base tier for $60 a month the first year, the price shooting up to $93 a month in year two. It also comes with a proprietary set-top, an Android TV-powered client device.

On the vMVPD side, the service is self-installed, thus generating AT&T’s projected capital expenditures savings. And it’s delivered over the open internet and not managed network, allowing customers to use any broadband service they want.

Of course, AT&T is hoping they choose its FTTH service. And for his part, McElfresh believes the new video service can help AT&T achieve its “50% penetration” goal for fiber.

“We have proof of how we do this historically,” he said. “As you look at the fiber that we built out in the ground in 2016, at the three-year mark, we roughly approach about a 50% share gain in that territory. And so for 2020, with the bulk of our investments behind us in this fiber plan, our tactics are to drive penetration with the fiber that we've built.”

AT&T’s bundling strategy will also include upcoming SVOD service HBO Max, as well as its legacy DirecTV satellite product. And in addition to fiber, the telecom will also be pushing 5G fixed wireless services, in regions where that makes sense.

“You'll see lead product offers that are the best products that we can offer from wireless, fiber and AT&T TV and HBO Max in geographies where we offer the best infrastructure-based broadband,” McElfresh said. “In parts of the territory where there is no broadband available, you'll see us lead with our satellite legacy pay TV product and wireless.”

Cord cutting is at a tipping point, with 23% of SVOD users now 55 and older, and pay TV operators now officially done with subsidizing unprofitable customers through aggressive promotions.

According to MoffettNathanson analyst Michael Nathanson, around 40% of the remaining pay TV ecosystem is exposed to cord cutting.

Nathanson surmises that about 60% of the 93.4 million pay TV homes in the U.S. contain regular sports viewers. And as long as major sports leagues continue to tie their key rights to the U.S. pay TV ecosystem, these viewers will provide a “potential floor” to the market.

Nathanson made his comments in a report highlighting his firm’s recent “Fall Summit on Cord-Cutting and the Future of Video.”

Nathanson bases his conclusions on data supplied by research company Altman Vilandrie & Company. His findings suggest that 85% of remaining pay TV subscribers are regular sports and news viewers. However, it’s the “sports” portion of that audience remains “the most entrenched pay TV subscribers, Nathanson suggests.

AT&T Now Going Bye Bye?

Meanwhile, with AT&T currently rolling out a full-featured virtual pay TV bundle that’s priced less than its legacy AT&T TV Now streaming service, Nathanson said the telecom is “essentially exiting" the vMVPD business.

Formerly known as DirecTV Now, AT&T’s three-year-old vMVPD has been in obvious decline, finishing the third quarter with 1.145 million remaining subscribers. This was down from a high of 1.809 million users at the end of the second quarter of 2018.

AT&T has stopped offering promotions like free OTT players for AT&T Now signups. It’s also no longer giving away the service to subscribers to unlimited wireless and other AT&T products.

Most tellingly, however, AT&T is slowly rolling out AT&T TV, which is a full featured streaming pay TV service, undercutting the AT&T TV Now with a $60 entry-level price point that delivers 73 channels and 500 hours of cloud DVR storage, as well as a free Android TV-based OTT device.

AT&T Now delivers only around 45 channels for a monthly price that has risen to $65.

Related: AT&T TV ‘Pilot’ Launch Expanded to Four More Markets

The marginalization of the once vital AT&T Now service comes as another notable player in the vMVPD business, Sony PlayStation Vue, prepares to exit the market in January.

AT&T has quietly launched the streaming version of its premium DirecTV satellite TV service, which it calls AT&T TV.

An AT&T rep told MCN that the service became available this week in New York City, Seattle, Minneapolis and Miami. In August, she said AT&T began “piloting” AT&T Now in nine markets; Orange and Riverside, California; Topeka, Kansas; Wichita, Kansas; El Paso, Texas; Odessa, Texas; Corpus Christi, Texas; St. Louis; Springfield, Missouri; and West Palm Beach, Florida.

The self-installed streaming service, which starts out for $59.99 a month for the first year with a 24-month contract, ships with an Android TV-powered set-top. After the first 12 months, the price of this entry-level “Entertainment” tier elevates to a very linear-pay-TV-like $93 a month.

The Entertainment tier has around 73 channels, including local broadcast stations, as well as ESPN, but no regional sports networks. Not including the Spanish-language-focused Optimo tier, there are four escalating AT&T TV tiers in all, cuitimanating with the $79.99-a-month Ultimate package. Here’s a link to the channel lists.

AT&T comes with a 500 GB cloud DVR. And the 4K-capable Android TV device, which supports popular OTT apps like Netflix, is free. But you only get one—additional devices for secondary viewing rooms costs $10 a month.

AT&T executives have lauded the operational costs improvements of AT&T TV over traditional DirecTV service, noting that they don’t have to launch pricey satellites, or send out truck rolls, to support the product. Also, integration of popular OTT apps—a challenge for traditional managed-service pay-TV offerings—is rather organic, since AT&T TV is and of itself a streaming service.

Shipping with a piece CPE, and including contracts, AT&T TV is not to be confused with AT&T TV Now, the virtual MVPD that AT&T seems to be quietly marginalizing. Indeed, the price of the 45-channel AT&T TV Now base package has swelled to $65 a month, just three years after the service was launched as “DirecTV Now” and priced at $35 a month.

After nearly reaching 2 million users in the third quarter of 2018, AT&T TV Now has been in steady decline, with AT&T cutting it off from the aggressive promotional deals that fueled its early growth. The vMVPD lost another 195,000 customers in the third quarter of this year, and now has around 1.145 million left. 

AT&T has set a May 2020 launch date for its upcoming streaming service, HBO Max and will price the service at $14.99 a month, on par with the HBO premium cable channel.

The wireless company also said that it will offer the service free for one year to those who already subscribe to an AT&T TV service. This includes AT&T TV, the upcoming streaming version of AT&T’s premium pay TV service.

“General entertainment streaming is the next great opportunity to aggregate and grow audience,” John Stankey, AT&T’s COO and WarnerMedia’s CEO, said at the company’s media event Tuesday on the Warner Bros.’ lot in Burbank, California. (The event was covered by Variety, Deadline Hollywood and The Hollywood Reporter, among other publications.)

Related: AT&T Says HBO Max Will Reach 50M Subscribers by 2024

AT&T revealed that an ad-supported version of HBO Max will debut in 2021 and also be bundled with AT&T TV. That same year, AT&T will debut live-streamed news and sports on the platform.

AT&T officials said they expect to have around 75 million to 90 million HBO Max subscribers by 2025, and around 50 million in the U.S. alone at that time.

At launch, AT&T—which has been steadily announcing content deals in recent months for HBO Max—said the platform will launch with around 10,000 hours of programming.

At its event Tuesday afternoon, HBO Max announced several more programming deals. These include:

• Exclusive streaming rights to South Park.
• Streaming rights to the first three seasons of Rick & Morty, with additional seasons coming after they air on Adult Swim.
• Two DC-related projects from producer Greg Berlanti.
• A sci-fi series called Raised by Wolves from Ridley Scott.
• Stand-up comedy specials from Conan O’Brien. 

AT&T Communications CEO John Donovan will retire as head of the phone company’s mobile, pay-TV and broadband unit on Oct. 1. AT&T said a replacement would be named “soon.”

“JD is a terrific leader and a tech visionary who helped drive AT&T’s leadership in connecting customers, from our 5G, fiber and FirstNet buildouts, to new products and platforms, to setting the global standard for software-defined networks,” said AT&T chairman and CEO Randall Stephenson in a press release. “He led the way in encouraging his team to continuously innovate and develop their skill sets for the future. We greatly appreciate his many contributions to our company’s success and his untiring dedication to serving customers and making our communities better. JD is a good friend, and I wish him and his family all the best in the years ahead.”

Donovan’s 11-year career with AT&T began in 2008 when he was named chief technology officer and was later promoted to chief strategy officer and group president of AT&T Technology and Operations. In July 2017 he was tapped to head the Communications unit, which serves more than 100 million mobile, broadband and pay-TV customers. On the pay-TV side, AT&T Communications includes its DirecTV satellite TV unit, Uverse, the DirecTV Now streaming video service and another streaming video offering -- AT&T TV -- that was launched in a few test markets earlier this month and should see a wider release in the fall. At the Credit Suisse conference in June, Donovan touted the new streaming product as a radical reshaping of the TV concept. 

“It’s been my honor to lead AT&T Communications during a period of unprecedented innovation and investment in new technology that is revolutionizing how people connect with their worlds,” Donovan said in a press release. “All that we’ve accomplished is a credit to the talented women and men of AT&T, and their passion for serving our customers. I’m looking forward to the future – spending more time with my family and watching with pride as the AT&T team continues to set the pace for the industry.”

AT&T has finally launched its streaming version of a full traditional pay TV bundle, with the portal for the new OTT service now live.

AT&T TV is now available in parts of five states: Orange County and Riverside, California; Corpus Christi, El Paso and Odessa, Texas; West Palm Beach, Florida; Topeka and Wichita, Kansas; and St. Louis and Springfield, Missouri.

The service is delivered over-the-top with a proprietary self-installed Android TV-based set-top box and cloud DVR.

But make no mistake, this isn’t a typical cheap and cheerful “cancel anytime” vMVPD service . In fact, the service tiers being offered, however, appear much like AT&T’s linear DirecTV satellite TV service, both in terms of pricing, nomenclature and commitment.

Yes, there are early termination fees.

For example, the “Entertainment” package is $89.99 for the first 12 months of a 24-month commitment, when bundled with a 25 Mbps - 100 Mbps AT&T wireline internet plan. The price shoots up to $133 a month for the second year. The Entertainment tier is also available as a stand-alone for $59.99 a month for the first 12 months and $93 a month starting the second year.

The tiers move up the ranks—$64.99 for the first year for “Choice,” $74.99 for “Xtra,” $79.99 for “Ultimate”—with each upgrade adding 20-plus channels. There’s also a Latino-targeted bundle called Optimo Mas for $64.99 a month. Notably, all of the bundles except for Mas include ESPN.

Also notable: There’s a rather hidden-in-the-fine-print $8.49-a-month regional sports network fee tacked onto the Choice tier and higher.

Overall, however, there doesn’t seem to be a lot of other hidden landmines—a set-top lease fee, say—and the service appears slightly cheaper than traditional DirecTV satellite service.

For their part, AT&T executives say the IP-based service is far more sustainable in an era of high program costs, given AT&T TV doesn’t requires truck rolls to residents, or the launch of expensive satellites.

And not to be overlooked, the Android TV-based service provides customers access to the full flora and fauna of the Google Play Store, meaning OTT apps like Netflix and YouTube are already integrated.

For AT&T, which lost 778,000 linear pay TV users in the first quarter, change is probably good. 

We’ve been hearing about it for more than a year now, but the Android TV invasion of the U.S. pay TV business has officially hit our shore lines.

Just look at all the U.S. pay TV activity surrounding the platform that occurred in July.

In the coming weeks, AT&T will begin the beta deployment of “thin-client” set-tops, based on the Google OTT platform, powering the new IP-based AT&T TV pay TV service.

Meanwhile, Madison, Wisc.-based TDS Telecom, which is using TiVo’s Next-Gen Platform to transition its video business into IPTV delivery, is choosing the TiVo cloud-based systems’ option to deploy video to Android TV-based CPE, as well as iOS and Android-powered mobile devices. TDS will become the first North American operator to deploy Arris’ Android TV-powered set-tops, selecting the Arris VIP6102W UHD IP model device.

Sioux Falls, S.D.-based Midco said it’s following the same plan. It just signed onto use the TiVo Next-Gen Platform and will also choose Android TV clients on the CPE end.

It was also noted by MCN in July that Buckeye Broadband and MaxxSouth, two cable operators owned by Toledo, Ohio-based Block Communications, started advertising new app-based video services powered by Evolution Digital’s full IP-based platform. The Evolution platform delivers IPTV services to iOS and Android mobile devices, as well as branded versions of Evolution Digital’s proprietary Android TV powered eStream 4K device.

Sikeston, Missouri-based operator Vast Broadband has also signed onto the Evolution Digital IPTV solution and will begin deployments toward the end fo the year.

Android TV is used by a limited number of smart TV manufacturers, as well as OTT devices such as Dish’s AirTV, but it’s market share among the big OTT ecosystems sold through retail channels—Roku, Amazon Fire TV, Apple TV, Google Chromecast, etc.— is pretty nascent.

However, the operator tier version of Android TV, which lets cable companies and other video service proprietors deliver highly customized managed services based on the technology, is thriving. Operators are able to deliver their branded, managed services, keeping control of their user data, to relatively inexpensive set-top hardware. They’re able to provide their customers access to most major OTT apps through the Google Play store. That now includes Amazon Prime Video, thanks to the detente recently carved out between Amazon and Google. Oh, and vMVPD service Hulu with Live TV will also soon be available on Android TV.

And these operators are also able to deliver voice control through Google Assistant technology.

In a U.S. pay TV business where Comcast’s X1 has helped make voice control and integration of Netflix, Hulu and other OTT apps table stakes, Android TV is providing a path for smaller operators that don’t have tech development labs to deliver next-generation video services.

The infiltration of Android TV is also being driven by the major video software suppliers, including TiVo, MobiTV and Evolution Digital and Amino, which have made Android TV compatibility a key component of end-to-end IPTV SaaS solution they’re providing to operators.

In December, a Google rep told MCN that 100 pay TV operators around the world were using Android TV. Shalini Govil-Pai, senior director of product management for Android TV, said the platform, designed to provide access to over-the-top apps on digital video players, is now being used by “tens of millions” of consumers, primarily in Europe and Asia.

By April, that number had increased to 140, a number that is certainly even higher still with all of the U.S. Android TV activity that was announced in July.

Android TV is making this push despite opposition from the biggest names in the cable business. Comcast, Charter Communications and Liberty Global back the rival Reference Design Kit (RDK), defines a different software stack for pay TV set-tops, network gateways and other CPE. 

AT&T confirmed reports that its new IP-delivered pay TV service will be called AT&T TV, and will launch in beta in select markets “later this summer.”

The wireless company made the confirmation during its second quarter earnings report Wednesday.

“We have some really high expectations for this product, and we’re going to learn from the pilot, and then we’ll expand to more cities as we go to the year,” said Randall Stephenson, CEO of AT&T. (Stephenson’s comments were provided by Seeking Alpha.)

Related: AT&T Gives Up on DirecTV Brand in Latest Streaming Ventures

Unlike AT&T’s current flagship virtual pay TV service, DirecTV Now, AT&T TV—which the company previously described as its “thin client” service—will include a full bundle of channels, and it will ship with a self-install set-top.

However, the service won’t require truck-roll installation, or the launch and maintenance of satellites.

“This thin client product that we’re bringing to market, it literally takes the customer acquisition costs and cuts it in half,” Stephenson added. “And the beauty of that is that you can begin to address a fundamental problem with the current linear TV business, and that is the price point, but the content costs just continue to grow.”

Related: AT&T Now the No. 2 U.S. Pay TV Company Behind Comcast

Describing AT&T TV as the “work horse” for AT&T’s pay TV aspirations for the next several years, Stephenson added, “We’ve got to find a way to get the cost curve down on this product, so we can keep people into the product for a longer-term basis. So, as you drive customer acquisition costs in half on AT&T TV, the new product we’re bringing to market, then you can bring the price points down and hold margins and still have the same value equation from a customer standpoint.”

AT&T’s choice not to leverage the DirecTV brand name for either its new SVOD service, HBO Max, or its new IP pay TV product is conspicuous, given the company’s $67.1 billion investment to acquire DirecTV just four years ago.

“The DirecTV product is going to have a really long life, and they’re going to be segments of the market for a long time, but that’s how you’ll address those segments of the market,” Stephenson said.

He also touched on NFL Sunday Ticket, which is entering its final year on DirecTV under the current multi-billion-dollar distribution deal.

“That’s something that served DirecTV well for many years,” Stephenson said. “However, unfortunately, right now, that content is tied to our satellite product. And so, it serves a good value as we come into the fall. It’ll be an important retention tool. But in terms of an opportunity to grow our business with that, when it’s anchored to a satellite product, it’s kind of hard to utilize it.”

These days, before any company launches one of the myriad new streaming ventures, you can pretty much guess that it’ll end with a “plus” or a “go” … or a “now.”

Of course, the surprising part of AT&T’s latest monikers is the utter lack of the name “DirecTV.”

HBO Max, which is the name of the company’s upcoming SVOD platform, will borrow the branding of a tried and true WarnerMedia asset—one that already has an SVOD user base of 8 million customers through HBO Now.

Meanwhile, screen grabs of internal AT&T communications, recently intercepted by website TheLayoff, reveal that the wireless giant is calling its upcoming premium “thin client” pay TV service “AT&T TV.”

When it launched DirecTV Now 30 months ago, it appeared the satellite brand would be key to the telecom's future video plans. But appears even the virtual MVPD platform, which quickly grew to 1.8 million subscribers before sputtering, is on the way to marginalization, too.

AT&T chairman and CEO Randall Stephenson said last month that virtual MVPD DirecTV Now will “eventually” be merged into HBO Max.

Also notable: AT&T mobility and entertainment president David Christopher, speaking last month at an investment bank conference in London, said DirecTV Now would be downsized to a “thin” service targeting the company’s 170 million mobile connections.

“We have emphasized [DirecTV Now] slightly less than we did when it first launched because we are focused more on other elements of the portfolio,” Christopher said.

For those keeping score on AT&T’s 2015 purchase of DirecTV, all I can say is that $67.1 billion doesn’t buy you as much brand equity as it used to.

AT&T’s marketing choices lend credence to rumors that began circulating last month—that AT&T might soon combine its declining DirecTV satellite TV operation with the equally challenged Dish Network satellite platform. Both divisions lost a combined 2.36 million customers in 2018.

With just under 24 million pay TV customers spread across DirecTV Now satellite, AT&T U-verse and DirecTV Now, AT&T still has more scale than any other operator in the pay TV business, including Comcast. But given AT&T’s new priority of monetizing WarnerMedia’s assets through SVOD, you wonder how much getting the best programming deals for linear pay TV matters anymore to the company.

Of course, more than a decade before AT&T bought it, DirecTV was stopped by regulators from merging with Dish. But regulatory concerns might be ebbing amid markedly decreased relevance and an overall competitive video marketplace.

“It is against this highly competitive backdrop that we now believe regulators could potentially allow for the combination of satellite/DBS players due to its antiquated technology, structural challenges (inability to bundle), as well as the emergence of broadband-delivered video— which is becoming the predominant form of video consumption of late,” wrote JPMorgan analyst Philip Cusick.