Report: No Apple Web TV Service at September iPhone Splash
Apple (AAPL) reportedly has delayed plans to announce a new subscription TV service intended to go hand-and-glove with the slated debut of its overhauled TV set top box on September 9 in San Francisco.
While Apple planned to showcase a Web-based subscription TV service at the same time as it unwrapped the next upgrade to its iPhone, the TV set top box and possibly new iPads, talks with leading TV networks to license programming reportedly have bogged down, leaving the vendor lacking content for the platform, according to a Bloomberg report.
The package of a TV set top box and Internet TV subscription service is important to Apple as the vendor looks to fan out its revenue generating vehicles beyond its flagship iPhones and Macs. At this point, discussions with content providers have slowed owing to haggling over price, with the networks said to want more than Apple reportedly is willing to pay, the report said.
In particular, negotiations with CBS, Fox and NBC have been stalled for months, according to Bloomberg’s sources. Still, the networks are said to be intrigued by a new player with Apple’s heft entering the market.
Apple reportedly is targeting a $40 a month lineup of popular channels.
Earlier reports suggested that users would have to wait for the Apple TV subscription service until later this year at the earliest but more likely not until sometime in 2016. While Apple wanted to deliver the subscription TV service and set top box in September to map to the start of the new broadcast television season, it’s stymied from moving ahead without enough content licensing deals in place, reports said.
The Wall Street Journal reported in March that Apple’s Internet TV service hopes to have ABC, Fox, CBS, ESPN and FX among a slimmed down lineup of some 25 streaming and broadcast channels lined up at a user cost of $30 to $40 a month.
