Charter Communications’ hard-won carriage renewal deal with The Walt Disney Co. last September was viewed as a watershed moment for pay TV, with the cable operator securing unprecedented abilities to bundle OTT services including Disney Plus Basic and ESPN Plus at no extra charge to its remaining 9.5 million Spectrum TV Select customers.
Outlining the strategy of ditching lesser-watched linear channels like Freeform and integrating popular SVOD services to investors during its memorable two-week standoff with Disney, soon-to-be-triumphant Charter CEO Christopher Winfrey described the hybrid OTT/pay TV model, which could be delivered and maximized over Charter’s Xumo connected-TV device JV with Comcast, as the “future of video.”
