In addition to VRT NU and VTM Go, there will be another free Flemish streaming platform: the channels VIER, VIJF and ZES will offer their programs on a new umbrella platform that will certainly have “Play” in its name. Program director Annick Bongers has announced this.
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Earlier it was announced that SBS, the company above FOUR, FIVE and ZES, will give its channels a makeover next year. They all get a prefix “Play”, a brand name that Telenet customers already know. After all, Play is now still a payment package from Telenet, with an entire catalog of films and series. This will soon be absorbed by the paid streaming service Streamz, which Telenet is launching together with DPG Media (VTM).
Telenet, which owns SBS, wants to continue to play the name Play and will therefore use it from the beginning of next year for another streaming platform. That will be free, but the programs will – just like with VTM Go – be accompanied by advertisements. Now the SBS stations already offer a large number of programs online, but only through their websites. The group did not yet have a cross-channel platform with a mobile application, such as with VTM Go and VRT NU.
This will change soon, although it is not yet clear how far SBS will go in this regard. Via VRT NU and VTM Go, for example, the channels can also be viewed in live stream on a TV set. SBS is certainly not taking that step: “live streaming for our channels is not foreseen”, it sounds. Should that happen, a free alternative would arise for all major Flemish channels. That could perhaps prompt Telenet customers to hand in their decoder.
SBS also confirms that an extra channel is in the works: after FOUR, FIVE and SIX comes SEVEN. “We cannot reveal the positioning today, but the channel profile of our fourth general channel has now been set and is now being further developed creatively,” says CEO Peter Quaghebeur. The content of the other channels is not affected.
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