MultiChoice To Add Netflix And Amazon Video Prime Streaming Services For Subscribers And Plans To Launch More Channels

MultiChoice will soon add both Netflix and Amazon Prime Video as global video streamers to its DStv platform, with the pay-TV operator that continues to show growth - adding roughly another 900 000 DStv and GOtv subscribers over its last financial year.

The subscriber tally according to its latest 2019/2020 financial results released on Wednesday, is now 19.5 million.

MultiChoice already runs Showmax its own subscription video-on-demand (SVOD) streaming service.

By adding international streaming services to it's existing DStv platform MultiChoice has now clearly decided that it will go the "super aggregator" way, similar to what pay-TV services ranging from the United States, United Kingdom, and New Zealand have done over the past year.

In this way, existing subscribers get access to further streaming services through DStv, paying their monthly bill in local currency for the add-ons, lessening payment friction and providing one place for subscribers to find and watch the content they like.

"We have long been a content aggregator, and this is proof of our aggregator model at work – providing simplicity, choice and convenience for our customers," says Calvo Mawela, MultiChoice CEO.

"As our industry evolves, we believe that we are well-positioned to benefit from both worlds – a large, growing pay-TV market in Africa, as well as an emerging over-the-top (OTT) opportunity, where our own OTT services and aggregation capabilities can drive success."

MultiChoice has shown a 5% increase in subscriber growth in its 2019/2020 financial year, taking its total pay-TV subscriber base to 19.5 million households.

South Africa still represents MultiChoice's biggest and most powerful market, with 8.4 million pay-TV households, while the rest of Africa combined represents 11.1 million households.

Besides adding two global streaming services, MultiChoice is also getting ready to roll-out and launch its as-yet-unnamed "DStv dishless", stand-alone DStv streaming service that will mimic its existing direct-to-Home (DTH) service but without the need for any installation.

MultiChoice added that over the last financial year it has produced 3 850 additional hours of local content with its local content library that now exceeds 56 800 hours. This means local content now accounts for 40% of its total content spend.

The company plans on doing two new co-productions, Blood Psalms and Rogue, launch four new local content TV channels including a new action movie channel and plans to further ramp up local content production in 2021.

SABC To Treat Sport Fans To Live Tennis Games From This Saturday

The South African Broadcasting Corporation (SABC), through its sports channel SABC Sport, has entered into a partnership with the Novak Djokovic Foundation to broadcast the Adria Tour Tennis Series live on SABC TV.

The Adria Tour Tennis Series is the brainchild of the ATP number 1 ranked tennis player, Novak Djokovic.

The tennis series will take place over 4 weekends. The matches will be played on clay court in Serbia, Croatia, Bosnia, Herzegovina and Montenegro. The tournament will feature top ranked ATP Tour tennis stars including Djokovic, Austrian Dominic Thiem, Bulgarian star Grigor Dimitrov as well as Croatian pair Borna Coric and Marin Cilic.

SABC Sport GM, Gary Rathbone says: “The partnership with the Novak Djokovic Foundation allows SABC Sport to bring a world class tennis tournament to all our sports loving audiences. SABC Sport, as a Free to Air sportscaster is a key link between all South Africans and some of the best sports content locally and from around the world. The next four weekends will be nothing short of exciting, exhilarating with end-to-end high impact tennis action and we are putting our fans in the best seat in the house to consume this world-class tennis content,  #ItsTimeForTennis.”

The partnership between SABC Sport and the Novak Djokovic Foundation comes at a time when sport fans around the world have been starved of live high octane sports action due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

The Adria Tour Tennis series will broadcast live on SABC 3, every weekend from this Saturday till 05 July.

Below is the line-up:

June 13th – 14th in Belgrade
June 20th – 21st in Zadar
June 27th – 28th in Montenegro
July 03rd – 04th in Banja Luka

July 2020 On FOX Africa | Killing Eve S2 | Continuing Episodes | Catch-Up

KILLING EVE S2
Wednesdays at 20:45 from 1 July
Repeats on Fridays at 14:00, Saturdays at 19:25, Sunday at 22:00.

An award-winning spy thriller starring Sandra Oh and Jodie Comer, Killing Eve centres on two women; Eve is a bored, whip-smart, pay-grade MI5 security officer whose desk-bound job doesn’t fulfil her fantasies of being a spy. Villanelle is a mercurial, talented killer who clings to the luxuries her violent job affords her. Killing Eve topples the typical spy-action thriller as these two fiercely intelligent women, equally obsessed with each other, go head to head in an epic game of cat and mouse. 

FRESH OFF THE BOAT S4
Sundays at 13:35 from Sunday 26 July

In the fourth season of this comedy series, the Huang family moves in with Honey (Chelsey Crisp) and Marvin (Ray Wise). Jessica (Constance Wu) realizes her dream of participating in Wheel of Fortune. Meanwhile, Eddie (Hudson Yang) is going through relationship troubles. Emery (Forrest Wheeler) is excited to start a year of school without his brothers around, but is shocked to discover that Evan (Ian Chen) has skipped a grade. Plus, Louis (Randall Park) has to contend with the fact that his kids are growing older and not appreciating his company anymore.

THE RESIDENT (S3) SUNDAYS (Marathons)
Sundays 5 and 12 July, from 11:40

In season 3, Red Rock Mountain Medical has taken over, inserting its own doctors – including new neurosurgeon Dr Barrett Cain (Morris Chestnut – Rosewood) – and nurses into the well-oiled machine that was once Chastain Memorial Hospital, and causing the doctors to fight harder than ever against the corrupting influence of money in healthcare. The hospital is being run like a profit-hungry corporation – reaping huge financial gains, while risking the lives of its patients.

THE SIMPSONS S21 - S23
Monday – Friday at 16:40 [Double bills]
An animated comedy series about a blue collar family – The Simpsons, who live in Springfield. Homer, the lovable father, stumbles apathetically through his family life and work at the local nuclear power plant. Marge, the overbearing, but responsible mother, Bart, the fourth grade underachiever and nemesis to Springfield elementary's principal, Lisa, the brainy and responsible eight-year-old, and Maggie, the oft-forgotten baby, make up the family.

GREY’S ANATOMY S15 (25 x 60)
Tuesdays at 20:45 from 9 June (ends 24 November)
Repeats on Saturdays at 20:15 and Sundays at 19:10

Grey Sloan Memorial Hospital — the toughest surgical residency program west of Harvard was a brutal training ground but now the former students have interns of their own to mentor. The doctors deal with life-or-death consequences on a daily basis — it’s in one another that they find comfort and friendship.

July 2020 On FOX Life Africa | Reality Stunt | Grey's Anatomy S12 | Continuing Episodes

STUNT “THE TRIPLE HUSTLE”
HUSTLE AND SOUL S1 – S2
Monday – Friday, at 9:50, 13 – 17 July (Three episodes at 09:45, 09:50, 11:15)
 
Hustle and Soul follows Chef Lawrence Page, owner and head chef of The Pink Tea Cup (PTC) restaurant. Lawrence resurrected the former West Village landmark and moved to the Fort Greene, Brooklyn on his quest to rise to the next level and score a coveted Michelin star. While Lawrence struggles to find the perfect recipe for success, he and his team will learn that it takes more than just good cooking and a good-looking staff to become Michelin elite. Heading up The Pink Tea Cup crew as General Manager is Lawrence's hot-tempered girlfriend Ana; including Sana, the flighty flirty hostess who is not afraid to stand up to Ana and go after everything she wants; Thandi, the PTC's lead server who is next in line to move up; and Candice, the head bartender who is as sweet as her drinks, but far from Michelin ready. The twins, Dominic and Stef, provide some much-needed comic relief at the restaurant where they can't seem to get anything right.

GREY’S ANATOMY S12 
Monday - Friday at 20:50 from 3 July (ends 5 August)

Grey Sloan Memorial Hospital — the toughest surgical residency program west of Harvard was a brutal training ground but now the former students have interns of their own to mentor. The doctors deal with life-or-death consequences on a daily basis — it’s in one another that they find comfort and friendship.

TELENOVELAS

ALONG CAME LOVE
Monday to Friday at 15:50

Along Came Love follows the beautiful Luciana who, after being deported, returns to the USA to reunite with the only family she has left: her mother and brother. After arriving at the vineyard where both have worked for many years, she meets David, the landowner and finds something unexpected: love.

SECRETS OF THE HOTEL
Monday to Friday at 16:40

A young man of humble origins travels to the Gran Hotel on outskirts of the San Cristóbal Tlaxico village to visit his sister Cristina who works as the floor supervisor. There, Julio discovers that more than a month after being dismissed for allegedly stealing from the hotel, she has disappeared from everyone’s memory. He decides to stay on as a waiter to investigate her disappearance but does not expect the love, mystery, death and betrayal that follow.

SHADOWS FROM THE PAST
Monday to Friday at 17:30

Two rival families living in the village of Santa Lucía, the Mendozas and the Alococers, are involved in a whirlwind of passion, pain, and revenge. Severiano Mendoza and Candela Santana are a rich and powerful couple who live at the ranch, "Las Ánimas", along with their young son, Cristóbal. Roberta and Raymundo Alcocer have a daughter named Alonza. However, they do not enjoy the same luxuries as the Mendoza family, which causes frustration and resentment in Roberta as nothing is enough to fill the inferiority complex that follows her like a shadow.

ROAD TO DESTINY
Monday to Friday at 18:20 

Luisa Fernanda Pérez, a beautiful, 18-year-old student, has two passions: mastering the violin and gardening, a skill she inherited from her father, Pedro, the former groundskeeper of the wealthy Altamirano family's estate. A chance encounter with destiny alters her life when she is injured in a car accident caused by Luis (her biological father), a playboy lawyer. In the process, Luisa falls for his stepson, Carlos, the attractive, young doctor who treats her in hospital.

TELENOVELA WEEKEND OMBINUSES

Saturday: 06:00 – 18:30 and 20:00 – 00:00

Sunday: 06:00 – 18:30, and 20:45 – 00:55

Please see schedule for details

REALITY WEEKDAYS

HUSTLE AND SOUL S1 – S2
Monday to Friday at 19:10 from 28 July (ends 16 August)

VINTAGE Z
Monday to Friday at 20:00 from 2 July (ends 17 July)

JUSTICE BY ANY MEANS
Monday to Friday at 19:20 from 17 June (ends 27 July)

INTERNATIONAL DRAMA

EMPIRE S6
Monday to Friday at 20:50, from3 July (Ends 28 July)

Golden Globe®-nominated EMPIRE enters its sixth and final season as one of television’s most popular and ground-breaking shows. A powerful drama about a family dynasty set within the glamorous and often dangerous world of hip-hop music, the show revolves around the Lyons and their media company, Empire Entertainment.

As Season Five hurtled toward its conclusion, Lucious (Terrence DaShon Howard) was forced to flee New York City, with the Feds hot on his trail. To make matters worse, Cookie (Golden Globe® winner Taraji P. Henson) refused to accompany him, declaring that he and Empire were no longer good for her. Season Six begins with the Lyon family splintered. Lucious is on the run and Cookie is finding success on her own. With Jamal residing in London and Hakeem (Bryshere Y. Gray) starring in "Empire: The Movie," Andre (Trai Byers) finds himself finally sitting on the Empire throne. Faced with threats from all directions, the Lyons will have to reunite to survive. They will have to decide what's most important – Empire, or their family.

ViacomCBS Will Be Launching A New Channel Carrying Content From BET And Showtime, Will This Perhaps Get Added On StarSat Or Serve As A Replacement To BET Africa On DStv?

ViacomCBS is to launch SHO*BET by the end of the year to do that it's taking up Showtime's Showcase channel in the United States.

The company is planning to relaunch the channel, which currently airs films, documentaries and comedy specials, with scripted series from both Showtime and BET.

It is the latest example of synergies between Viacom and CBS since its merger in December.

President and CEO Bob Bakish, speaking on the company’s investor call following its fourth-quarter financials, said, “We see an even bigger opportunity to grow Showtime subscribers by making better use of its plex channels, some of which are currently underutilized. To that end, we will be rebranding and relaunching Showcase as SHO*BET this summer featuring AA scripted series from Showtime and BET.”

He added, “We see this as a compelling value creation play that will allow us to benefit from the growing demand for premium, African American content across platforms.

Now in Africa, where the channel can be seen through MultiChoice's DStv platform. It's currently stuffed with movies leaving less space for all the crappy and decent programming.

BET Africa, has become a strong brand in the market with its local productions like Black Tax and iSono so the chances of them replacing it is very little at the same time these brands merged so anything is possible.