Cablevision Systems said Monday it has reached a comprehensive carriage agreement with NBCUniversal, including all the programming giant's cable channels and owned-and-operated television stations. Terms of the long-term deal were not disclosed.
According to Cablevision, the deal includes expansive rights to on-demand content from NBCUniversal’s portfolio of cable and broadcast networks, as well as access to live channels across multiple platforms both in and out of the home.
The agreement also covers retransmission consent for NBC- and Telemundo-owned stations and continued carriage of NBCUniversal’s top rated cable networks, including USA Network, Bravo, Cloo, Chiller, CNBC, E!, G4, MSNBC, mun2, NBC Sports Network, Oxygen, Style, Syfy, Telemundo and The Golf Channel, as well as Comcast SportsNet Philadelphia. (Cablevision has customers in South Jersey, which is Phillies' territory.)
“Cablevision has always been a terrific partner to NBCUniversal and I’m thrilled they continue to recognize the worth of our top quality broadcast and cable networks and the value a multi-platform offering brings to their customers,” Matt Bond, executive vice president of content distribution at NBCUniversal, said in a statement. "This broad agreement validates how content providers and distributors can come together and develop mutually beneficial deals of this magnitude.”
Cablevision senior vice president of programming acquisition Tom Montemagno said: “This agreement ensures our customers will continue to enjoy many of the great networks and brands of cable television for years to come, including NBC, USA, CNBC and Bravo. It also, for the first time, allows us to deliver this programming to our customers outside the home, and we look forward offering a variety of these new NBCUniversal services starting early next year.”
Montemagno's boss until recently was Mac Budill, who in October was named president of TV networks' distribution at NBCUniversal, reporting to Bond. Representatives for the two companies said Budill was not involved in the negotiations for either company.
