AT&T’s premium TV service, AT&T TV, and the Now packages are soon going to merge to form a new brand – DirecTV Stream.
This is being teased by the company since last week, and the official change happens on August 26th. The content includes under this new brand is acquired from the TPG Capital deal, excluding HBO’s.
AT&T’s New Streaming Service
It’s no doubt that the OTT war is heating up rapidly. The market which is purely dominated by Netflix once upon a time is now flooded with new players like Peacock TV, HBO Max, Disney+, etc.
Existing players like Amazon Prime Video and Hulu too are spending a lot of money to buy digital streaming rights of various TV series and movies, and grab a chunk of this lucrative market. And a new player eyeing on this idea is AT&T, which is failing since the beginning.
The American telecom giant has launched AT&T TV last year, a premium TV subscription. And later came up with AT&T TV Now, a slimmer version of an on-demand streaming service. As both these are not considered by the community much, it’s now rebranding itself as DirecTV Stream.
As per a news release, “AT&T satellite, streaming or IP video customers will automatically keep their video service, any bundled wireless, internet or HBO Max services, and associated discounts with no action needed.”
The company is notifying users about this change in the home screens of AT&T TV and Now apps, since August 14th. And it confirmed to The Verge that an official rebranding would take place on August 26th, which is next week.
The content in the rebranded service comes from TPG Capital’s deal, which now has 30% in AT&T’s new video streaming unit. The deal doesn’t include HBO Max, as it’s set to merge with Discovery next year.
