As the launch partner for Fullscreen’s coming $4.99 per month SVOD service, AT&T will emphasize a mobile-first approach, but will complement that with distribution of Fullscreen's content across other platforms, including the big screen. 

“We think this is a rather important part of our entertainment strategy as we target this particular demographic and look to build relationships with consumers who value content differently and consume it differently,” Tony Goncalves, the long-time DirecTV exec who now serves as senior vice president of strategy at the merged company, said. “We want to service all segments of the market, and we want to give them choice and flexibility.”

In addition to marketing the new Fullscreen SVOD offering to AT&T’s base of mobile, broadband and video subs, content from the service will also be featured as a programming block on the AUDIENCE Network, a linear service for U-verse TV and  DirecTV customers.

AT&T is working on specific offers involving Fullscreen, but it will also complement the set of DirecTV-branded OTT services that are in development and slated to launch in Q4, Goncalves said.

But, beyond the AUDIENCE block, are there any plans yet to offer Fullscreen as a “channel” on the traditional set-top box? Stay tuned.

“There is a premium to be had for highly curated content specifically targeted at a demo…We’re looking at a variety of ways to package the content,” Goncalves said, noting that some of that content will be featured on DirecTV’s and U-verse TV’s authenticated TV Everywhere apps.

But he said Fullscreen’s new offering is not unlike the intentions of MTV – a network targeted at the younger generation – while also carrying a premium like an HBO, Starz or Showtime.

“This one just happens to be one that’s targeted at millennials based on content by millennials and packaged in a way that’s mobile-first,” he said. “The true test is whether this mobile-first audience transcends to the big screen. The first test of that is this AUDIENCE block.”

And, with the new Fullscreen subscription service, AT&T isn’t the first to be targeting millennial audiences with a mobile-first offering. Verizon has go90 and Comcast has Watchable (which is also offered on X1 set-tops), but the key difference there is that those are free, ad-supported offerings. 

AOL and Publicis Groupe have inked an ad partnership for go90, Verizon’s new OTT mobile video offering.

The deal, they said, grants Publicis’ agencies and brand clients exclusive advertising inventory on go90 for three months beginning in the fourth quarter of 2015, and extends non-exclusively to the third-quarter of 2016. Publicis will also have first access to data segmentation capabilities and new ad units “with full creative support from testing through launch,” and early access to Verizon and AOL data management platform targeting in the first quarter of 2016.

Publicis’ partners will also gain access to a new program from  AOL called Head Start that will provide insight on the look and feel of go90’s user experience as new features are rolled out.

They announced the agreement at AOL’s Future Front event in New York City, kicked off in tandem with Advertising Week 2015.

Go90 recently debuted as an invitation-only beta.Announced content partners include New Form Digital, UphoricTV, ESPN, Comedy Central, VH1, Nickelodeon, MTV, Spike, Food Network, TLC, Discovery Network, NFL Network, HGTV, BET, Investigation Discovery, AwesomenessTV, Collective Digital Studio, Defy, Vice, Maker Studios, Machinima, Fullscreen, StyleHaul, and Tastemade.

“Publicis has been an important advertising partner for AOL for many years, and we are excited to be working together once again to bring new branding opportunities to their customers, as well as relevant and valuable advertising experience to mobile users,” said AOL president Bob Lord, in a statement. “The coming together of premium, curated video in go90, richness in data and automation technology will enable their advertisers to drive conversations with millennial-centric audiences that are, more and more, tuning in through the machine in their pocket rather than in their living room.”

“There is a significant opportunity that sits at the intersection of mobile, video and Millennials, and go90 was developed specifically to connect marketers into this interchange that is quickly becoming the primary screen,” added John Nitti, chief investment officer for ZenithOptimedia, which helped Publicis Groupe lock up the deal. “The consumption shift is rapid and we are happy to be leveraging the lion’s share of this premium real estate on behalf of our clients to help drive their competitive edge.”

Verizon completed its acquisition of AOL in June.

Publicis Groupe offers a a range of services spanning digital (DigitasLBi, Razorfish, Rosetta, VivaKi, Nurun), advertising (BBH, Leo Burnett, Publicis Worldwide, Saatchi & Saatchi), public affairs, corporate communications and events (MSLGROUP),  and media strategy, planning and buying (Starcom MediaVest Group and ZenithOptimedia). 

New Form Digital said it will develop and produce six scripted series for go90, Verizon’s mobile-first video service for millennial audiences that recently debuted as an invitation-only beta.

The following six original series will premiere on go90 over the next year, with 12-episode runs for each:

The Fourth Door: A fantasy adventure about a woman who wakes up in the embattled way-station between this life and the next; populated by mysterious and dangerous creatures who force her to face the past, present and future to save the man she loves. Created and directed by Tony E. Valenzuela.

#DoOver (working title): What if you could repeat the most important day of your life until you perfected it? Allison Lee gets more than she wished for when she's stuck repeating her epic 25th birthday bash which goes up in flames, over and over again. Created and written by Kathleen Grace and Shawn Dempewolff-Barrett.

Miss Earth (working title): An intergalactic sci-fi comedy following Victoria Young, a pageant queen on Earth, who takes the place of her battle-tested twin sister in a competition with all of humanity at stake. Created by and starring Anna Akana.

Mr. Student Body President (working title): A dark political comedy about an incredibly likable and charming teenage dictator. Ferris Bueller meets Frank Underwood. Created and directed by Ryan Hunter and Jack Ferry.

Cold (working title): A dramatic crime series about a teenage girl who seeks out her birth parents only to find that her separation from them occurred due to significant tragedy. In her efforts to uncover what really happened, she explores the town where she would have grown up, finding that although seemingly quaint - it is a place with many secrets. Created and directed by Emily Diana Ruth.

And one additional series to be announced shortly.

All of those series will be available on go90, starting with The Fourth Door in October 2015. 

Other announced content partners for go90 include UphoricTV, ESPN, Comedy Central, VH1, Nickelodeon, MTV, Spike, Food Network, TLC, Discovery Network, NFL Network, HGTV, BET, Investigation Discovery, AwesomenessTV, Collective Digital Studio, Defy, Vice, Maker Studios, Machinima, Fullscreen, StyleHaul, and Tastemade.

UphoricTV, an OTT digital service dedicated to the “global festival circuit,” said it’s poised to arrive this fall on go90, Verizon’s digital-first video service tailored for millennial audiences.

UG Strategies, in partnership with U.S.-based marketing company Corso Agency, announced the launch of UphoricTV today. UphoricTV will first be offered in the U.S. via go90, and plans to announce other domestic and international distributers and multi-channel networks over the next six to 12 months. UphoricTV said it will also broadcast via YouTube and other social media platforms.

UphoricTV said its focus is to provide an exclusive look into the world of music festivals, as well as coverage from food festivals, film festivals, and other “major global cultural destinations.”  Original fare will span artist and music content, behind-the-scenes footage, documentaries, and interviews.

Go90, a free, ad-supported service,  launched in invitation-only trial form earlier this month, and will later expand to other consumers.  Go90 will initially be offered on iOS and  Android-powered mobile devices.  Other announced go90 content partners include ESPN, Comedy Central, VH1, Nickelodeon, MTV, Spike, Food Network, TLC, Discovery Network, NFL Network, HGTV, BET, Investigation Discovery, AwesomenessTV, Collective Digital Studio, Defy, Vice, Maker Studios, Machinima, Fullscreen, StyleHaul, and Tastemade.

“After more than a decade of working with festivals from around the world, we have seen the demand for festival content rise exponentially,” said Parag Bhandari, CEO of UG Strategies, in a statement.  “Festivals of all kinds have become critical to pop culture, with enthusiasm for them rivaling that of major sporting events, each offering so much more than music and thus creating endless sources of creative and unique video content. UphoricTV’s debut on digital, ‘cord-cutting’ platforms such as go90, alongside major content providers like ESPN, Vice Media, Viacom, and others, manifests how important these events have become.”

“After 25 years in the festival experiential space, I cannot tell you how many fans have begged for us to let them in on what we know and what we see,” added David Corso, CEO of Corso Agency. “UphoricTV is the answer to their demands, and is perfectly aligned to strengthen the burgeoning global festival circuit. We’re excited to access our extensive network in music, entertainment and festivals to help bring this to life.”

NFL games and live concerts will be among the video fare offered by Go90, a free, “mobile-first” over-the-top offering from Verizon Communications targeted to millennials that will debut this week, according toThe New York Times.

Go90 is expected to be a free, ad-supported service that offers a blend of live and on-demand content. Though initially developed for mobile devices (the name of the service is about rotating a smartphone 90 degrees to view video in landscape mode), Verizon’s also noodling TV-based streaming strategies, the paper said.

Announced partners for Verizon’s new service include Discovery Communications, Vice Media, Scripps Networks Interactive, ACC Digital Network, Campus Insiders, CBS Sports, ESPN, 120 Sports,  Awesomeness TV, and AOL, which Verizon acquired in June. The New York Times noted that the offering will also feature shows from Comedy Central, NFL Network, Tastemade and Machinima.

Brian Angiolet, Verizon’s senior vice president for consumer products, told the  Times that Verizon struck mobile rights for specific shows rather than crafting deals that provide access to entire networks. Expanding on its NFL mobile exclusive, Verizon Wireless announced last week that all current and legacy price plans will include live streaming of Sunday local NFL games as well as Thursday Night Football, Sunday Night Football and Monday Night Football matchups, plus mobile streaming access to NFL Network.

Verizon’s new mobile video offering will be network-agnostic, but will “work best” on Verizon networks, Marni Walden, EVP and president of product innovation and new business at Verizon, said on a conference call in June. She also confirmed that “ad-sponsored data” will be part of the offering.

Variety reported that the launch of Go90 could happen as soon as Tuesday (September 8), noting that a splash page for the service showed a customer agreement that temporarily read: “Effective date: September 8, 2015.”

Verizon has been asked for further comment about the apparent imminent launch of the Go90 service.

Comcast, meanwhile, appears to be nearing the debut of Watchable, an ad-supported OTT service tailored for younger audiences, but has not announced a launch date for the service, nor confirmed that Watchable will be the name of the service when it does go live.

Looking to broaden its mobile-focused programmatic ad platform, AOL said it has inked a deal to acquire mobile advertising specialist Millennial Media.

AOL said the deal, for $1.75 per share of Millennial Media common stock, will give it a supply-side platform for app monetization and add more than 65,000 apps to its suite of publisher offerings, and bring more mobile ad scale to the ONE by AOL, its unified multiscreen digital ad platform.

The deal, valued at almost $250 million, represents a 31% premium, as Millennial shares closed Wednesday at $1.34 per share. Shares of Millennial Media were up 39 cents (29.10%), to $1.73 per share in pre-market trading Thursday.

Via the acquisition, AOL said it will also have access to roughly 1 billion active unique users globally and expand its cross-screen targeting capabilities and broaden its reach to international markets such as Singapore, Japan, the U.K., France and Germany.

The deal also comes on the heels of Verizon’s acquisition of AOL, giving the carrier a slate of online video content and programmatic ad systems that are expected to play a big role in go90, Verizon’s coming “mobile-first” video offering.

 “As we continue to invest in our platforms and technology, the acquisition of Millennial Media accelerates our competitive mobile offering in ONE by AOL and enhances our current publisher offering with an ‘all in’ monetization platform for app developers,” AOL president Bob Lord said, in a statement.

"By joining AOL, we will be adding additional mobile expertise to AOL's growing technology assets,” added Michael Barrett, president and CEO of Millennial Media.

Founded in 2006, Millennial Media is headquartered in Baltimore, Md., with U.S. offices in Atlanta, Boston, New York and San Francisco, and international offices in Hamburg, London, Paris, Singapore and Tokyo. Millennial Media has built up its own portfolio through acquisitions spanning of TapMetrics, Condaptive, Metaresolver, Jumptap and Nexage.

Millennial Media will become a wholly owned subsidiary of AOL when the deal is closed sometime this fall. 

Indicating that the launch of Comcast’s new online video offering, dubbed Watchable, is drawing closer, Varietylocated a Web-based demo of the service and uncovered some additional details on what’s to come.

Comcast isn’t commenting on the apparent sneak preview, which looks to have been a beta demo that was left out in the open temporarily. The operator also has not announced a launch date nor confirmed that Watchable will indeed be the name of the service when it goes live.

But a person familiar with the plan said earlier that Watchable is being developed as a curated, ad-supported OTT video service that will be offered on Comcast’s IP-capable X1 platform, which is delivered on set-tops as well as browsers and mobile apps, and will also become available to non-Comcast customers. It’s expected to offer a variety of professional and semi-professional content from several sources, including Maker Studios, GoPro, Fullscreen, Vox Media (now backed by Comcast’s NBCU), AwesomenessTV, The Onion and Vice Media, and NBCU.

From that standpoint, it appears that Watchable will share similarities to go90, Verizon’s coming mobile-first, ad-supported OTT offering.

According to Variety’s spin with Watchable, the service emphasizes “editor-driven curation,” and featured playlists with labels such as “Obama Nation,” “Epic Fails” and “Foodie Delight,” but the demo version (a snap of the home page, posted by Variety, is shown above), did not include a section for user comments.

The report noted that the service initially for the U.S. audiences, though the help section indicates that Comcast is “working to bring Watchable to additional countries.”  Other content providers featured on the demo site included the Verge, Popsugar, iFood.tv, Machinima, Smosh, Jukin Media, Discovery Digital and Fox Sports Digital, Variety said. 

Go90, Verizon’s ad-supported “mobile first” OTT video service is inching toward its commercial debut, with a launch expected in the “coming days,” Bloomberg reported Tuesday, citing a person familiar with the situation.

Verizon has said previously that the service is poised for a late summer debut.

Update: Verizon has not pinpointed a launch date, but offered this statement: “Stay tuned, go90 will not be like anything you’ve seen from us before.”

In the meantime, Verizon has announced several content partners for Go90, including Discovery Communications, Vice Media, Scripps Networks Interactive, ACC Digital Network, Campus Insiders, CBS Sports, ESPN, 120 Sports,  Awesomeness TV, and AOL, which Verizon acquired in June and brings with it key programmatic advertising technology. 

According to Bloomberg, Go90 will start off with a smaller subset of content from partners such as AOL, DreamWorks Animation SKG, Awesomeness TV, Vice Media and Viacom.  That jibes with what Verizon CFO Fran Shammo said on the company’s second quarter earnings call last month: “It won't be the full entire of everything that we contemplate within the product set,” he said then.

Verizon Digital Media Services, Verizon’s cloud video unit, is expected to play a key role in the packaging and distribution of Go90.

“When I talk to our clients, one of the big priorities is how do they monetize and create value for their content online,” Bob Toohey, president of VDMS, told Multichannel News in a recent interview (subscription required). “We all know the ad dollar spend from TV to digital is moving and it’s just at the early stages. That’s where there’s a very large opportunity.”

Verizon’s coming “mobile-first” video service for millennials will be called Go90 and initially be launched under a free, ad-supported model, Varietyreported, citing details found on a pre-launch staging site that has since been taken down.

Before the site was removed from public view, Go90 was being characterized as a service that will offer “live music, exclusive events, best of web content, sports, prime time and more,” according to the report. "We wanted to create a mobile-first, video-based app that can keep up with you and your on-the-go social life, One that features completely immersive live and on-demand content, no matter where you are or where you’re going. No cord required."

Verizon hasn’t announced a launch date for the service, but company CFO Fran Shammo said on this week’s earnings call that it will debut in the “late summer” and that content from AOL, which Verizon just acquired, will also be featured.  However, the service “won't be the full entire of everything that we contemplate within the product set,” he said.

Other announced content partners for the coming service include Vice Media, Scripps Networks Interactive, ACC Digital Network, Campus Insiders, CBS Sports, ESPN, 120 Sports and Awesomeness TV.

The site discovered by Variety also featured content from others, including Victorious, GoPro and Vevo, and references to shows from Fox and AMC and NFL fare (Verizon has mobile distribution rights for NFL games and other content), but a Verizon official told the pub that not all content shown on the staging site is accurate.

Verizon has already said the mobile-first offering will include “ad-sponsored data” (expected to be so-called “zero-rated” content that won’t count toward a wireless sub’s monthly usage cap) and feature both live and on-demand content.  The service will be network-agnostic, but will be optimized for Verizon’s mobile network. Verizon will use bandwidth-friendly LTE multicast technology to deliver some live content. 

Verizon said it has struck deals with a handful of sports-oriented programming partners for a new mobile video service that’s slated to launch later this year with a lineup that's expected to feature  20 to 30 channels.

Verizon said its coming “mobile-first” service will offer programming from ACC Digital Network, Campus Insiders, CBS Sports, ESPN and 120 Sports. Verizon announced in March that Awesomeness TV, the multichannel network tailored for teens and millennial audiences, will also product more than 200 hours of content for the new offering.

Verizon has not announced pricing and packaging for the service, but said it will be available later this year to Verizon Wireless customers with data services on their smartphones and tablets. Verizon, citing a study by CTM/Univeristy of Southern California, found that nearly two-thirds of millennials consider smartphones or tablets, not TVs, as their primary device.

Among the new agreements, CBS Sports will provide Verizon with “dozens of live major college games,” with ESPN providing “select live college football and college games” and access to shows such as 30 for 30.  

“Sports fans are some of the most passionate around, and they never want to miss a single play,” said Terry Denson, vice president, content acquisition and strategy at Verizon, in a statement. “With consumers – especially younger consumers – demanding access to entertainment and information that matters to them, whenever and wherever they are, college sports with all of its live programming and networks targeted to millennials are a natural fit for any mobile-first video platform. These brands are at the top of the league, and we’re excited to work with them as new content models for our customers develop and evolve.” 

Verizon is developing the OTT service following its acquisition of Intel Media’s OnCue online video assets in 2014