Cox Communications is offering movie channels Epix and Vutopia to its subscribers across the nation, both on-demand and online, and it was also announced that Cox was one of the cable operators using Epix’s online platform for subscriber authentication.
Cox first launched Epix and Vutopia in its northern Virginia system in April before today’s nationwide rollout. The April deployment didn’t include the online viewing that’s available today.
Both are available for free to Cox digital customers who subscribe to its Movie Pak offering.
Epix is a new movie channel that offers Hollywood titles, classic feature films, original series and comedy specials from Paramount, MGM, Lionsgate and other studios.
Vutopia is a new VOD movie service offering hundreds of movies on-demand, including Hollywood movies and documentaries. Cox said a large portion of the content from Epix and Vutopia is available in HD.
Both Epix and Vutopia offer online movies and include all of the same titles available on TV. Movie Pak customers use their Cox.com username and password to authenticate themselves to access the online content.
“Cox is committed to meeting our customers’ needs for video on whatever screen they prefer most,” said Steve Necessary, vice president of video product development. “Our activities with EpixHD.com and Vutopia.com are evidence of that commitment as we fully recognize that while most entertainment video is consumed on the TV, broadband video provides a valuable complementary service.”
Cox also announced today that it was offering most new release pay-per-view on-demand movies in high-definition at the same price as the standard-definition titles.
Cox said in April that it would be launching its version of TV Everywhere this month but didn’t provide a lot of details.
Cox and Mediacom Communications, along with Charter Communications in July, are authenticating their customers through Epix’s online platform.
Charter, Mediacom and Cox launched the Epix channel and its SVOD service in April and are supporting the introduction of the third platform, EpixHD.com, with launch marketing campaigns that include free previews in June and July.
Charter CTO and executive vice president of operations Marwan Fawaz said in a recent interview with CED that Charter would be using its Charter.net Web portal to provide subscribers access to online content.
“Choice for the customer – how, where and when they want to watch TV – is important. Launching Epix’s three service platforms enables Charter customers to embrace and complement how they experience video,” said Rich DiGeronimo, Charter’s vice president of product management.
Epix is a joint venture between Viacom, its Paramount Pictures unit, Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Studios and Lionsgate.