The Atlantic

AT&T’s Troubling Plan to Change HBO

The telecom giant, which just acquired Time Warner, is seeking to drastically change the premium-cable channel in order to compete with the likes of Netflix.
Source: AP / Eric Risberg

This past February, HBO added the most U.S. subscribers in its history, boosting its user base by 11 percent (the company has some 142 million global subscribers). The steady growth of the premium-cable and streaming service to in revenue last year helped power its parent company, Time Warner, to $31.3 billion in revenue—a 7-percent overall jump in other divisions. Since the telecom giant AT&T began its bid to acquire Time Warner, it came to be widely understood that HBO was one of the most prized parts of the deal, which became official after a lengthy legal battle.

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