ZDF blasts German VoD ruling

The head of German broadcaster ZDF has slammed a decision by regulators to block the launch of a joint venture VoD service that would have brought together programming from 17 local prodcos.

Alexander Coridass, president and CEO of ZDF, said it was “deplorable” that the project, which was to host 60 years worth of German television content, was blocked by Germany’s Federal Cartel Office.

“It seems that German competition law prevents companies like ZDF Enterprises from playing an active role in the development of VoD markets,” Coridass said of regulators’ decision earlier this week to halt plans for the service, dubbed Germany’s Gold.

“In times of the changing use of media, of modified viewer needs and of the fragmentation of offers, it would have been important to have a portal with a focus on German and European content,” Cordiass continued.

“Nevertheless, we shall continue to pursue our commitment to new technologies and market developments. We have an enormous catalogue of VoD rights, that we acquired independently from ZDF, and we will find new ways to market it.”

Seventeen German production companies, including ADF and ARD, had linked up to launch Germany’s Gold.

But the Federal Cartel Office put the project on ice this week, claiming the project violated antitrust rules as there would have been collusion on producing and exclusive programming deals.

The Bunderskartellamt also feared that other platforms would be shut out of the broadcasters’ content.

Other partners involved in the project were Studio Hamburg, Bavaria Fernsehproduktion, Beta Film, Ziegler Film, MME, Brainpool and Telepool. ZDF has now confirmed the project will be discontinued.

The service would have mainly carried TV content produced by Gold’s partners, including documentaries, TV movies, children’s and youth series, and entertainment shows, as well as some feature films.

German authorities previously blocked RTL and ProSiebenSat.1 from launching their own VoD joint venture.

In related news, ProSiebenSat.1 has this week launched its Maxdome portal in Austria. The VoD service is available online as well as on Samsung and other smart TVs, on various set-top boxes, and connected Blu-Ray players.