Competition Commission includes Netflix and LoveFilm in film probe

Competition Commission

The Competition Commission has extended its investigation into BSkyB's stranglehold on pay-TV films to include Netflix and LoveFilm.

Last year the regulator published a provisional decision that BSkyB's contracts with the six major Hollywood studios – Paramount, Disney, Warner Bros, Sony Pictures, Universal Studios and 20th Century Fox – were anti-competitive, creating "a significant barrier to entry to potential competitiors", including BT and Virgin Media.

The Competition Commission admits it now needs to assess "potentially relevant" developments, in particular the arrival of US giant Netflix which launched in the UK and Ireland in January.

And the decision by Amazon-owned LoveFilm to offer movie streaming to its customers has further expanded the video-on-demand market.

"We recognised in our provisional findings that, were developments in the market to occur, it would be necessary to take them into account before reaching our final views," says the commission.

It has now extended the deadline for delivering its final report until July, so that it can take these recent developments in the market into account.

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Andy Clough

Andy is Global Brand Director of What Hi-Fi? and has been a technology journalist for 30 years. During that time he has covered everything from VHS and Betamax, MiniDisc and DCC to CDi, Laserdisc and 3D TV, and any number of other formats that have come and gone. He loves nothing better than a good old format war. Andy edited several hi-fi and home cinema magazines before relaunching whathifi.com in 2008 and helping turn it into the global success it is today. When not listening to music or watching TV, he spends far too much of his time reading about cars he can't afford to buy.