HBO’s CEO says it will begin streaming its premium TV content to iPads within a few months. The service, HBO Go, will be extended to mobile devices in a bid to outmaneuver Netflix, which already offers an iPad app.
In a Bloomberg interview, HBO CEO Reed Hastings said within six months, it will extend its current HBO Go service to mobile devices. Currently, subscribers to the premium TV channel can view original programming on their computers. In July, video rental service Netflix began offering a similar iPad app.
HBO-owner Time Warner views Netflix as a “potential competitor.” Netflix, which earlier this month paid Epix cable over $900 million for the rights to MGM, Paramount and Lions Gate Entertainment movies, would like to add HBO content to the mix.
Earlier this year, Netflix announced it would stream movies to the iPhone, as well as the iPad.
Ed Sutherland is a veteran technology journalist who first heard of Apple when they grew on trees, Yahoo was run out of a Stanford dorm and Google was an unknown upstart. Since then, Sutherland has covered the whole technology landscape, concentrating on tracking the trends and figuring out the finances of large (and small) technology companies.
