Virgin Media has secured access to Sky’s entertainment, sport and movie channels, including their HD variants for a further five years.
The deal means Virgin Media will be able to offer customers Sky Sports 3 HD, Sky Sports 4 HD, and Sky Sports F1 HD for the first time.
It also allows the cable firm to include the entertainment channels in the Virgin TV Anywhere app which gives smartphone and tablet users access to their subscription content.
In addition, customers will be able to use the Sky Sports and Sky Movies apps to access live and on demand content from this summer.
The deal, which excludes Sky Atlantic, boosts the attractiveness of Virgin Media’s channel offering at a time when it’s been under pressure from Sky and new TV entrants BT and TalkTalk.
In a statement the two firms said the deal “gives each company clear financial visibility and opens up the opportunity for more Virgin TV customers to enjoy Sky’s channels.” Jeremy Darroch, Chief Executive, Sky, commented: “We’re pleased to have extended our partnership with Virgin Media, which increases the reach of our content and reinforces our broadly-based approach to growth.
“This agreement builds on our long-standing relationship with Virgin Media, enabling us to deliver our great channels to even more homes across the UK and opening up additional sources of revenue.” Tom Mockridge, Virgin Media’s Chief Executive Officer, added: “We are excited our customers will be able to watch even more great TV from Sky on more devices as a result of the most extensive agreement ever signed between Virgin Media and Sky.
“This promises to be a fantastic summer of entertainment and our customers, whether at home or on the go, will get to enjoy Sky’s range of channels for years to come as a result of our investment.”