{"id":330559,"date":"2019-11-28T20:08:39","date_gmt":"2019-11-28T18:08:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/?p=330559"},"modified":"2019-11-29T02:15:51","modified_gmt":"2019-11-29T00:15:51","slug":"cell-c-shutting-down-black","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/cellular\/330559-cell-c-shutting-down-black.html","title":{"rendered":"Cell C shutting down Black"},"content":{"rendered":"

Cell C is shutting down its Black streaming service.<\/p>\n

In an SMS sent to Black users, the company stated that the service will close on 31 December 2019.<\/p>\n

This follows a “review of our product portfolio”, said Cell C. It also provided users with a voucher code which gives them 3 months of Showmax for free.<\/p>\n

One Black user stated that the move was “disappointing if you are on a Media Play contract” and now no longer receive the streaming subscription and streaming data.<\/p>\n

The future of entertainment<\/h3>\n

Cell C launched Black<\/strong><\/a> in November 2017 and punted it as the future of entertainment.<\/p>\n

\u201cNo longer will you have to wait 9 months before you can watch the newest movies in South Africa,\u201d said former Cell C CEO Jose Dos Santos at the launch.<\/p>\n

Black offered video streaming, music, concert tickets, and sports betting at launch.<\/p>\n

Cell C also launched a media box as part of the play, called the blackBOX<\/strong><\/a>.<\/p>\n

The device let users access Black streaming services on their TV, including the live streaming of channels. Users could access Black via Android and iOS apps, as well.<\/p>\n

Closing down<\/h3>\n

In recent months, however, the future of Black has looked uncertain.<\/p>\n

MyBroadband learned in July 2019 that Cell C had stopped<\/strong><\/a> its investment in the Black platform, which included freezing the development of its web and mobile apps.<\/p>\n

In September, Cell C suspended<\/strong><\/a> the linear channels on Black, and entered negotiations with content providers.<\/p>\n

Later that month, Cell C CEO Douglas Craigie Stevenson said Cell C\u2019s investment in Black was not a good move.<\/p>\n

\u201cBlack was not the right play for Cell C,\u201d said Craigie Stevenson.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe did not have the resources to compete in that environment.”<\/p>\n

Cell C’s decision<\/h3>\n

Cell C said that following a review of the company\u2019s product portfolio and decision to redirect expenditure to revenue-generating initiatives, it made the decision to decommission Black.<\/p>\n

“Content remains part of Cell C\u2019s broader strategy, however, we have had to carefully look at how we approach this to ensure we provide a sustainable service that customers want while at the same time offer a service that makes commercial sense to the business,” said Cell C.<\/p>\n

Cell C will not be accepting any new registrations on Black, and will be refunding customers for outright movie purchases.<\/p>\n

Existing customers will be able to use the service until 31 December 2019.<\/p>\n

“Cell C is in the process of notifying existing customers on Black of its decision to end this service.”<\/p>\n

\n

Black SMS<\/h3>\n

\"Cell<\/a><\/p>\n

\n

Now read: Battery theft forces MTN to shut down cellphone towers<\/a><\/h3>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Cell C is shutting down its Black streaming service at the end of the year.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":23,"featured_media":299836,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[33560,355,35,2924],"class_list":["post-330559","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-cellular","tag-black","tag-cell-c","tag-headline","tag-streaming"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/330559"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/23"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=330559"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/330559\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":330563,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/330559\/revisions\/330563"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/299836"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=330559"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=330559"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=330559"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}