Dish said it is integrating Netflix into its service. It will be available as an app to customers who have a second-generation Hopper DVR.
The company plans to also roll out the app out on its Joey, Super Joey and Wireless Joey clients.
Even as Netflix has topped 50 million subscribers, most large MVPDs want Netflix to go away. In Canada, Rogers and Shaw teamed to create a competitor to Netflix.
That makes Dish’s decision to become the first of the very biggest service providers to integrate Netflix remarkable.
But MVPDs integrating Netflix is far from unprecedented. There’s been a near-constant stream this year of smaller MVPDs making Netflix available to their customers. The list includes several companies that use TiVo equipment, including Atlantic Broadband, Cogeco, GCI, Grande Communications, RCN, and Suddenlink. WOW, which uses Arris boxes, just joined that group. Outside North America, Virgin Media and ComHem (both TiVo users) have integrated Netflix into their services, as has Belgacom.
Dish said it is putting the Netflix icon on its home screen. Alternatively, subscribers will be able to pressing a button on their remotes to open a menu of apps that will include Netflix.
Vivek Khemka, Dish senior vice president of product management, said, “This app integration eliminates the need to switch television inputs to access content on varying devices. It gives our customers easy access to their favorite shows and movies, on both Dish and Netflix, without ever having to leave their Hopper.”
The app remains functionally separate from Dish’s linear and on-demand content, but the company said it is considering integrating Netflix content directly into its search functionality across live, recorded and VOD programs for both the Hopper as well as Dish’s forthcoming OTT service.
“As the first major pay-TV provider in the U.S. to add the Netflix app to its set-top box, DISH strengthens an already robust video entertainment experience for its customers,” said Bill Holmes, global head of business development at Netflix. “Many households subscribe to both Netflix and a traditional pay-TV service. Our vast library of TV shows and movies, combined with Dish’s lineup of live television content, gives customers easy access to a wide variety of complementary programming.”
