New Delhi: As news media companies look for ways to survive and thrive in a fiercely aggressive digital market, the latest TV network to enter the crowded market of streaming news is AT&T's CNN. The US-based Cable News Service (CNN) has announced its new venture CNN Plus - a streaming platform which will exist alongside its existing linear TV networks.
According to the announcement, the subscription-based streaming service will feature eight to twelve hours of live programming daily. The network has already begun developing dozens of programs and hiring the requisite employees as part of an urgent bid to keep up with changing consumer demands amid cord-cutting trends across the US.
CNN+ is the start of a new era of the company, said WarnerMedia News and Sports chairman and CNN Worldwide president, Jeff Zucker on Monday. "CNN invented cable news in 1980, defined online news in 1995 and now is taking an important step in expanding what news can be by launching a direct-to-consumer streaming subscription service in 2022," he said in a statement.
Terming it as “the most important launch for CNN” since the launch of the network in June, 1980, chief digital officer Andrew Morse said CNN+ will be launched in the US in the first quarter of 2022 and roll out in other countries later.
Apart from at least eight hours of live programming which the company says, will be different from “what CNN produces on TV”, the new service will have original series, and interactive programming, that will allow subscribers to engage directly with talent and experts about the issues that matter most to them.
The company is yet to disclose how much it will cost consumers.
With around 4,000 employees, CNN has one of the largest news operations in the world. It is hiring about 450 people for CNN+, from producers to engineers to marketers, said Morse on Monday. “The sizable number of job openings is a reflection of CNN parent WarnerMedia's investment in the product on the heels of the HBO Max streaming service launch in 2020,” he added.
