As the ViacomCBS merger continues to get closer and closer to being sealed, it seems the two companies are already looking into ways to aggregate their content. On an earnings call today, Joseph Ianniello, CBS Corporation’s president and acting CEO, hinted at the fact that some CBS content will be making its way to Pluto TV soon.
“Stay tuned for more announcements as we’re getting CBS content on to Pluto. We said, starting tomorrow, you’ll see some of that and you’ll see more of that in the coming weeks,” Ianniello said. “So we are focused on doing that. And it’s a win-win because it’s greater distribution. It’s the top of the funnel like — we like to say. So it’s really additive.”
Back in August, Viacom CEO Bob Bakish also mentioned that Pluto will be receiving some CBS content, with CBS Sports HQ and ET Live most likely to be the first two programs on the platform.
During the call, Ianniello also announced that CBS All Access will have exclusive live marquee sports for the very first time. He stated: “The UEFA Champions League, including a UEFA Europa League, and the newly created UEFA European Conference League will be coming to CBS and CBS Sports platforms with all matches available on All Access and select games airing on broadcast. We will now have more than 400 matches per year spanning nine months across the calendar.”
Though they did not reveal the amount of subscribers on Showtime and CBS All Access have currently, the company projected they will reach a combined 25 million subscribers for both platforms by 2022.