NEW YORK, NY - AT&T Chairman and CEO Randall Stephenson speaks at a news conference in November 2017. As customers migrate from traditional television to streaming platforms, AT&T is determined to adapt.
The company will introduce a leaner, cheaper DirecTV alternative for streamers by the end of this year, even though there is already a DirecTV streaming option. Additionally, the company is developing a new subscription service built on the catalogs of HBO and Warner Bros. in the model of the widely celebrated Disney+. Combined with its existing offerings, the new products will bring AT&T’s total number of streaming services to five.
Although the first quarter likely represented the worst DirecTV loss from these two-year subscriptions, Synesael said the departures will still be much higher than usual.Hoping to coax back in those abandoning their dishes, AT&T CEO Randall Stephenson said on the earnings call that the new DirecTV service would attract customers who are unable—or unwilling—to pay for satellite. “It allows us to get into the market at a lower price point,” he said.
Even AT&T’s ultra-cheap OTT service, with the unsubtle name of WatchTV, has failed to get much traction. The $15 month-to-month service was designed to be bundled with AT&T’s wireless plans. As of the end of 2018, it had fewer than 500,000 subscribers. Details on AT&T’s new app won’t be available until the fall, but it could be priced as competitively as Disney+, McCormack said. The service could be relatively cheap to produce since it would be mostly based on an existing catalog of content. It could even be thrown in for free to make AT&T bundles more attractive. “I think it can add value for AT&T,” McCormack said.
ATT is late to the party. Other streaming services are beating them and people have discovered how over the air FREE channels are available by modern antennas.
DirecTV Now is losing subscribers because its no cheaper than actual satellite/cable. Streaming services should provide the content you want for cheaper. Even things like YouTubeTV are hiking the price for unwanted content now. I've canceled everything due to the price hikes.
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