TIM and RAI have signed a strategic agreement that will allow all subscribers to TIMvision, the TIM on-demand television platform, to watch absolute premières of all 20 films released by Rai Cinema/01 to the cinemas in recent months.
The cycle will start out with Giuseppe Tornatore’s “La corrispondenza” and will close with Alessandro Siani’s latest film “Mr. Felicità”. In 2017, other box office hits covered by the agreement include Matteo Rovere’s “Veloce come il vento”, Paolo Virzì’s “La Pazza gioia”, Pif’s “In guerra per amore” and Gabriele Muccino’s “L’estate addosso”.
Just a year after hitting the cinemas, all contents will be available exclusively on-demand for 24 months on TIMvision. These same films will then be broadcast on the Rai network as from thirty days after being put on-line by TIMvision.
In enriching the film offer with new premium contents, TIM has confirmed its clear focus on customers who, using the new generation TIM fixed and mobile networks, access an evolved television platform and an exclusive, high quality entertainment offer.
Entirely in line with its public service mission, the agreement will allow Rai to offer all Italians a large selection of great films available as television premières, just one year after their cinema release.
The agreement stresses the industrial importance for the two companies of premium contents distribution through new technology and their commitment to optimising great Italian cinema in a continuously-evolving market context. With this agreement, TIM and RAI intend, in fact, to privilege all enthusiasts, facilitating the development of services dedicated to the new television consumption models.
The initiative reinforces the synergies implemented by the previous agreements, thanks to which the TIMvision subscription includes RAI products in its catalogue: over 200 films and more than 500 hours of TV dramas and programmes, as well as the last 7 days’ of viewing schedules offered by the main free to air networks.
“We are extremely proud of this important agreement reached with RAI” - said Flavio Cattaneo, TIM's Chief Executive Officer. “It is thanks to partnerships like this that we are able to offer the general public and our customers exclusive viewings of the most successful Italian films. The initiative confirms our strategy, aiming to speed up on quadruple play. Together with RAI, we are also working on the launch of further joint projects aimed at developing film, television drama and audiovisual works."
“This agreement” - said Antonio Campo Dall’Orto, RAI’s General Manager - “marks a further step forward in the RAI strategy in support of the Italian cinema system and the production of value for our public, to whom we will be able to offer an important range of films only very recently released to the cinemas: contents and enjoyment times that were previously premium, are now available to all RAI subscribers. A result” - Mr Campo Dall’Orto continues - “that has been made possible thanks to the further concrete achievement of a shared strategy with TIM, with a view to becoming a public service media company that does not see itself as a competitor, but rather a “driver” of the Italian production industry. We believe, in fact, that the more operative players there are, the better the value chain is preserved and the greater the guarantee to the public of quality contents. All this thanks to a renewed team spirit, with a collaboration between the parent company, Rai Cinema and Rai Com, which allows the company to act with shared intent, enabling us to obtain important results like those seen today.”
Rome, 3 February 2017
