Stan snags Roadshow

New Australian subscription VoD (SVoD) service Stan has stolen a march on its rivals by sealing an extensive content agreement with the country’s biggest distributor, Roadshow.

Stan gets exclusive SVoD rights to blockbusters including The Lego Movie, The Hunger Games: Mockingjay Part 1, The Wolf of Wall Street and Edge of Tomorrow, as well as The Inbetweeners 2, A Walk Among the Tombstones, John Wick, The Judge, Wolf Creek 2 and Felony.

The streaming service will have access to the first-run films at the same time as their pay TV premiere on Foxtel Movies, and the deal means Roadshow’s films will no longer screen on Foxtel’s 10-month-old SVoD platform Presto Movies.

Stan outbid Netflix, which wanted Roadshow’s content for its Australian service that is due to arrive in late March, C21 understands.

Jointly owned by Nine Entertainment and Fairfax Media, Stan launched on January 26, streaming film and TV content for A$10 (US$8.08) a month, with a 30-day free trial.

The arrangement also covers Roadshow’s TV series including UK conspiracy thriller Utopia, Australian dramas Bikie Wars: Brothers in Arms and Brides of Christ, comedies Frontline and The Hollowmen and kids series LazyTown, Dino Dan and Animalia.

Roadshow was an obvious partner for Stan because the distributor has an output deal with the Nine Network. The deal includes a raft of library films – some of which are SVoD exclusives, including The Matrix and The Lord of the Rings trilogies, Sex and the City: The Movie and Sex and the City 2, Sherlock Holmes and Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows, Red Dog, Mad Max and The Man from Snowy River.

Stan CEO Mike Sneesby said: “We are bidding on and buying more first-run titles that will come to the platform.” He said the response from subscribers who signed up on January 26 was “much bigger than we imagined.”

In a cross-promotion, Nine screened the first two episodes of Transparent at 22.00 on January 27, drawing 178,000 viewers for the first episode. Stan has exclusive Australian rights to the Amazon Studios series.