'Sports Illustrated' Tries Amazon To Get into Video Business

Sports Illustrated is once again trying to get into the video business, this time launching a streaming version of Sports Illustrated TV on Amazon Channels.

Amazon Prime members can subscribe to SI TV for $4.99 a month. The channel will be accessible through the Prime Video app on TVs, streaming media players, mobile devices, Amazon Fire TV, Fire TV Stick and Fire tablets or online at Amazon.com/amazonchannels.

Sports Illustrated was part of Time Warner before the company spun off its troubled Time Inc. publishing businesses. SI the magazine is cutting its print run to just 27 issues this year.

Time Warner offered a  CNN Sports Illustrated cable channel in 1996 but it was unable to get enough distribution amid competition from ESPN and Fox and others.

Related: Amazon Denies It's Building Free Version of Prime Video

SI’s new TV offering will face formidable digital competition from ESPN, Fox as well as online outfits like Bleacher Report (owned by Time Warner) and Barstool Sports.

SI TV will feature SI Now, a daily show.

The network has greenlit five original shows: weekly studio series, The Crossover, Planet Futbol and The The Line, plus documentary series The Vault and SI: Under the Cover.

SI TV will also feature movies including the Rocky series, The Bad News Bears, Eight Men Out and Rollerball.

Jon Lafayette

Jon has been business editor of Broadcasting+Cable since 2010. He focuses on revenue-generating activities, including advertising and distribution, as well as executive intrigue and merger and acquisition activity. Just about any story is fair game, if a dollar sign can make its way into the article. Before B+C, Jon covered the industry for TVWeek, Cable World, Electronic Media, Advertising Age and The New York Post. A native New Yorker, Jon is hiding in plain sight in the suburbs of Chicago.