Discovery streaming service on horizon

tom.pullar-strecker@stuff.co. nz

Discovery has completed its acquisition of television channel Three and the rest of Mediaworks’ TV business, signalling there will be no immediate shake-up in its line-up.

The United States entertainment giant will unveil a ‘‘global streaming service’’ tomorrow, New Zealand time, and will sell subscriptions to its programmes direct to the public.

Discovery NZ and Australia joint general manager Glen Kyne said he hoped the service would be available in New Zealand within the next 12 months.

Local sales of the global streaming service would be booked by the New Zealand subsidiary which would help market the service, he said.

‘‘No plan yet because we don’t have a timeline on it, but you can expect us to be very hands-on.’’

But Kyne said the company valued and did not anticipate any changes to its relationship with Sky TV which bundles six Discovery

channels within its paytv service.

‘‘There is certainly no intent to change the pay-tv channels – the relationship with Sky is very important.’’

Discovery was also continuing the arrangement where its Newshub journalism arm provides television news bulletins for Sky’s free-to-air Prime channel, he said.

It would continue to broadcast the eight free-to-air channels that were in Mediaworks’ portfolio, of which TV3 is the most watched.

‘‘It is business as usual as we sit here today.’’

But Discovery had the ability to bring more ‘‘content and different types of content targeting different audiences,’’ he said, indicating it would have more information about that in the new year.

‘‘The focus in New Zealand is going to be on those free-to-air channels over the next six to 12 months.’’

The change in ownership opened the door to more investment, some of which would be cash but a lot of which would be ‘‘capability’’, he said.

Discovery’s purchase of Mediaworks’ loss-making television business for an undisclosed sum was widely regarded as the best possible outcome for Newshub and Mediaworks’ TV arm when it was announced in September after a year-long search for a buyer.

Auckland-based Kyne said Discovery’s operations in New Zealand and Australia would be managed as a single operation by himself and Sydney-based comanager Rebecca Kent.

The company employs about 450 staff in New Zealand as a result of the Mediaworks TV acquisition and about 80 in Australia, he said.