Paramount+ expands ‘channels’ with ‘Survivor’, ‘SpongeBob’ & ‘CSI: Miami’

MacGyver

ViacomCBS-owned streamer Paramount+ is expanding its live channels offering, rolling out 18 linear offerings for its subscribers.

The channels are streamed 24/7 and offer themed programming, with 24/7 Laughs stocking comedies such as Hot In Cleveland and Tosh.O, and All Day Drama featuring The Twilight Zone and The Guardian.

Kids & Family Fun is stocked with iCarly and Zoey 101, a Crime & Justice brand offers CSI: Miami and MacGyver, and TV Classics is scheduled with shows such as I Love Lucy and The Love Boat.

SpongeBob & Survivor

Programming is taken from ViacomCBS’s library and output from channels including flagship CBS, as well as Nickelodeon, MTV and the Smithsonian Channel.

There are also IP-specific channels, including one offering shows from the Star Trek franchise, another with a SpongeBob SquarePants theme, a Survivor network that airs the US version of the Banijay format. A RuPaul’s Drag Race channel is also being prepped for launch later this month.

SpongeBob SquarePants

The offerings join a growing band of ‘live’ channels on Paramount+, although they had previously been focused on news and sports.

It also reflects a similar set-up used by ViacomCBS’s sibling streamer Pluto TV, whose former CEO Tom Ryan was named president & CEO of ViacomCBS streaming last year. That came 18 months after ViacomCBS acquired ad-supported streamer Pluto for $340m.

Ryan said the launch of ‘Live Channels’ on Paramount+ came amid “strong consumer appetite for reimagined linear channels that provide effortless, lean-back entertainment.”

“Inspired and informed by the winning model Pluto TV pioneered and popularised, these highly curated channels underscore the power of our unified streaming organisation and serve as a product differentiator in the SVOD space, by offering subscribers yet another way to experience and discover programming on Paramount+.”