CES: AT&T Launches Screen Pack

New $5 a month subscription service offers U-verse customers access to movie libraries on TVs, tablets and smartphones

By George Winslow -- Broadcasting & Cable, 1/7/2013 12:45:00 PM

Complete Coverage: CES 2013

AT&T has launched a new $5 a month subscription service for U-verse subscribers that will allow them to access a library of movies on demand on their TVs, Uverse.com and via the U-verse app for tablets and mobile phones.

At launch, Screen Pack will offer movies from such studios as Sony and MGM, with the telco expecting to add additional movie titles and ultimately TV programming in the future, noted Maria Dillard, VP of U-verse and video products, AT&T Home Solutions.

The telco is offering a free preview of the service between Jan. 7 and 13. The service is currently only being marketed to U-verse customers. "The goal is to offer them more options for the movies they want," she noted, adding that the service would complement the large library of on demand content they already offer.a

At CES, the telco is holding a developers summit on Jan. 7 and also announced two new apps for the U-verse-enabled apps, Dillard noted.

One app, Twonky Beam, allows user to send a video clip from a mobile device to the TV set with a swipe of the finger and then view it on the larger screen.

A separate Pix & Flix app, created in the AT&T Labs, allows U-verse TV customers with high-speed Internet connections to "throw" photos stored on a mobile device to their TV, making it easy to view those images on the big screen.

These two apps join several other U-verse-enabled TV apps that are available customers with high-speed Internet access. Customers can connect their apps to any U-verse receiver in the home through channel 9301, without any special equipment.

Both apps are also an example of the type of innovation that the telco is trying to encourage at the Jan. 7 Developers Summit in Las Vegas and its U-verse-enabled apps.

Working with AT&T Labs and the AT&T Foundry, developers like PacketVideo are able to plug AT&T's technology into their apps and services through open AT&T's open APIs, significantly speeding up the pace of development, Dillard noted.