Suddenlink Communications continues to rack up carriage deals in the wake of its decision to pass on Viacom’s suite of cable networks, most recently reaching a broad, multi-year deal with Entertainment Studios' Comedy.TV.
The deal, terms of which were not disclosed, is one of several that Suddenlink has reached in the days after it failed to reach a carriage agreement with Viacom, parent of MTV, Comedy Central, VH1 and Nickelodeon. Since the Viacom channels went dark on Oct. 1, Suddenlink has teed up about 20 additional channels as replacements, and has reached carriage deals with Revolt TV, CBS, RLTV, The Blaze, Sprout, Discovery Communications, Up and Aspire.
“Our goal and commitment is to provide Suddenlink and their valuable customers the very best in comedy,” Entertainment Studios founder, chairman and CEO Byron Allen said in a statement. “Our new affiliation with Suddenlink is another big step in bringing Comedy.TV to more viewers in nearly 90 U.S. television markets.”
Entertainment Studios owns seven 24-hour networks – Comedy.TV, Recipe.TV, Cars.TV, ES.TV, Mydestination.TV and JusticeCentral.TV – and produces, distributes and sells advertising for 37 television programs. With a library of over 4,000 hours of owned content across multiple genres, Entertainment Studios provides video content to broadcast television stations, cable television networks, mobile devices, multimedia platforms, and online.
Comedy.TV offers talk shows like Comics Unleashed, stand-up routines from up-and-coming comedians and sitcoms like The First Family and Mr. Box Office.
"Comedy.TV is a terrific addition to our channel line-up,” Suddenlink senior vice president and chief programming officer Kathy Payne said in a statement. “The network delivers a unique mix of today’s funniest comedians, stand-up comedy performances, sitcoms, and talk shows to our customers."
