With the launch of Chromecast in Australia, Foxtel has taken the opportunity to announce that Presto will finally be coming to Android. Presto is Foxtel’s premium ‘all-you-can-eat’ movies service, which they intend to make available deliver to selected Android tablets starting in July.
While it’s been available for iOS since, March, Foxtel seems to have been waiting for something like the launch of Chromecast to finally deliver the service to Android users. Speaking of the launch, Director of Presto & VOD, Shaun James, said :
We’ve had a great response from customers since we launched Presto. Our customers are really enjoying the unparalleled access to the quality and recency of movie titles available within a Presto subscription. There simply isn’t any other Australian movie service offering the quality of movies all included for one low monthly subscription price. Today that offer is even more compelling as we announce plans to bring Presto to the big screen in our customers’ living rooms via Google Chromecast. What’s more, we’re also making the move to Android devices to continue our push to make Presto accessible to as many people as possible.
Foxtel is wanting you to trial the new service, and while their trial isn’t free, they will offer you a month of access for $4.99. The on-going price for the Presto service is $19.99 per month, but with no lock-in contracts it’s a viable option if you’re not wanting to go through the rigmorale of setting up Netflix.
Foxtel has been around for a fair while and they’ve manged to setup partnerships with some major movie distributors. Presto offers films from major international and domestic studios such as The Great Gatsby, Fast & Furious 6, Monsters University, World War Z and Elysium as well as films from smaller independents studios.
It’s an internet based service so obviously you will need an internet connection to access the service, this includes 3G and 4G services from mobile providers, but you may want to check your data caps.
Exactly which ‘Selected’ Android devices will be included in the initial launch is unknown, but we strongly suspect that given their history, Samsung devices will be high on the list. It’s an interesting service which we can’t wait to take for a spin, we’ll let you know how it goes when it launches for Android in July.
Now they just need to add Chromecast support to Foxtel Go
I think those of us who already pay subs to Foxtel would be happier if they sorted out Foxtel Go for more devices.
This, though, I can see being a good option for those who don’t sub to Foxtel already.
Absolutely correct. Their record on releasing Go for Android outside of Samsung devices has been absolutely disgusting. The only possible explanation is that they received a bung from Samsung to hold back on releasing it for other devices. There is zero technical reason for it.