Polsat dramatically expands OTT offering

Polish commercial broadcaster Polsat Group has added a raft of 31 new channels to its Ipla OTT service, expanding the offering to 77 services across seven packages.

Ipla has added sports channels Eleven and Eleven Sports HD – which are part of the Ipla Eleven Sports package – Polsat Sport Fight HD and Extreme Sports HD.

Movie and drama channel additions include TNT HD, Universal Channel, 13th Street, Sci-Fi and Novela TV.

Ipla has also added entertainment and lifestyle services Discovery Life, E! Entertainment, ID HD, Lifetime HD, CI Polsat, Polsat Food, TLC HD and Discovery Turbo Xtra along with factual channels Discovery Science HD, Animal Planet HD, Travel Channel HD, History 2 HD, Discovery Historia and Water Planet.

Other additions include music channels MTV Music 24, MTV Rocks and VH1 Classic, and kids channels Disney Channel, Disney Junior, Disney XD, Boomerang and Cartoon Network HD.

Polsat is marketing the expanded channel line-up within seven revamped packages. These are Ipla Knowledge and News, Ipla Films and Series, Ipla Entertainment, Ipla Kids, Ipla Sport and Ipla Eleven Sport. Most are available for PLN9.90 a month with discounts available to subscribers of Cyfrowy Polsat and Plus. Ipla Films and Series and Ipla Sport each cost PLN19.90 a month, while Ipla Eleven Sport costs PLN15.

Kinga Ciukta, development director for online services at Cyfrowy Polsat, said that the expansion of the service was a strategic move that reflected the changing ways in which users were consuming video content.

Ipla is available via any ISP in Poland, and can be viewed on computers, smartphones, tablets, set-tops and selected smart TVs.

The service competes with other OTT offerings in the Polish market including Player.pl from its main rival broadcast group, TVN, which has attempted to expand its appeal by commissioning a number of online original series.