Paramount+ reveals launch dates for US, Canada, Nordics and Australia

ViacomCBS is to launch streamer Paramount+ across the US on 4 March and has also revealed more details of the service’s international roll-out plans.

Paramount+, a rebooted version of existing streamer CBS All Access, will launch across Latin America on the same date as the US, before being rolled out into the Nordics on 25 March and Australia in the middle of the year, where it will replace ViacomCBS’s existing streamer 10 All Access.

CBS All Access in Canada will also be rebranded to Paramount+ on 4 March, but the service’s “expanded offering” will only become available later in the year.

Originals & ‘funnelling’ strategy

Paramount+ will offer content from across ViacomCBS brands, including MTV, BET, Comedy Central, CBS, Paramount Television Studios, Nickelodeon, and Smithsonian Channel, as well as movies from Paramount Pictures.

The streamer revealed a raft of originals for the service late last year, including a drama spun off from Paramount movie The Godfather, while other scripted series include spy show Lioness from Yellowstone’s Taylor Sheridan and a revival of Mara Brock Akil’s sitcom The Game – which ran on ViacomCBS-owned networks The CW and BET.

Bob Bakish

New factual offerings such as The Real Criminal Minds, a spin-off from the scripted series, will be on offer alongside shows such as SpongeBob SquarePants-inspired Kamp Koral, highlighting ViacomCBS’s leveraging of its existing IP for ‘new’ content.

ViacomCBS president and CEO Bob Bakish will provide further details of the company’s streaming strategy during an investors presentation on 24 February. He has already said he wants its fast-growing AVOD service Pluto TV to “funnel” customers to SVOD’s Paramount+ and Showtime OTT, with the ad-supported streamer’s CEO Tom Ryan recently appointed to the head of a new-look global streaming structure.

As part of those changes, Marc DeBevoise stepped down from his role as chief digital officer, while long-serving exec Pierluigi Gazzolo, ViacomCBS Networks International (VCNI)’s president of streaming & studios, also departed. The latter recently emerged at US Hispanic firm Univision.

ViacomCBS is also planning to shut down its smaller legacy streamers, such as MTV Hits, as the focus turns to Paramount+, with other platforms potentially in the firing line ranging from Noggin to Comedy Central Now.