Channel 4 and Sky today announced they have renewed and expanded their long-term commercial partnership.
The new multi-year agreement will extend the strategic relationship, giving both parties more opportunities to collaborate, support commercial growth, and innovate as broadcasting evolves in the future.
The partnership will make even more Channel 4 content available to Sky customers and will see further and deeper integration of All 4 into all of Sky’s existing and future TV products.
The deal also gives Channel 4 the opportunity to unlock new digital advertising revenues to support the delivery of its Future4 strategy.
Using the advertising technologies developed by Freewheel, Channel 4’s advertising inventory across linear and on demand will become addressable, allowing the broadcaster to further improve its content monetisation across Sky’s platforms.
Sky customers will be offered a broader range of Channel 4 content including more than 1,000 hours of All 4 Exclusives.
This is in addition to comprehensive catch-up and a wide range of Channel 4 box sets, including a variety of upfront box set stacks (where entire series are made available ahead of linear broadcast).
Alex Mahon, chief executive at Channel 4 said: “When we set out our Future4 strategy last year, we made clear that securing strategic distribution partnerships would be a vital part of ensuring we can maximise our reach and impact with viewers in a digital age, grow our revenues and compete more effectively for the future. I’m delighted to have agreed this deal, which extends a longstanding and incredibly successful partnership between Channel 4 and Sky.”
This builds on a successful partnership with Sky Media in which Channel 4 Sales will integrate with Sky AdSmart, to better tailer ads to different pay TV households, and support CFlight, the industry’s first unified advertising metric that captures live, on-demand and time-shifted commercial impressions.
For Sky, this is the latest in a series of moves to grow its partner base. In the latter part of 2020, Sky finalised a new multi-year European partnership with Amazon, launching Prime Video on Sky and NOW devices, and signed long-term partnerships with Entertainment One and STUDIOCANAL, bolstering Sky Cinema’s offerings.
Sky customers already have access to content from Netflix, Disney+, Warner Media (HBO), Showtime, Discovery, Fox, Sony, and many other partners in each of Sky’s markets. Adding to this, Sky has brought lifestyle and entertainment apps like Fiit, Roxi and Peloton onto Sky Q.
