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Blinkbox Vodafone Tesco

Vodafone reportedly courting buyout of Tesco's TV streaming service Blinkbox

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By John McCarthy, Opinion Editor

December 1, 2014 | 2 min read

Vodafone is reportedly primed to take Blinkbox,Tesco’s on-demand video service off its hands, as the struggling supermarket attempts to balance its books after a dismal year of trading.

Blinkbox allows subscribers to stream TV, movies and music

The service was the subject of a multimillion pound marketing drive this March, marking the first time the supermarket had invested in above-the-line marketing for the web and app-based service.

Blinkbox has faced fierce competition in a saturated market dominated by the likes of Netflix, Sky, Amazon and Apple, and has seen a loss of £18.5m in the last 12 months, according to the Guardian.

However, a Blinkbox source told The Drum it is "business as usual" at the company, as it gears up to expand its mobile porfolio more heavily. It has also just launched its Watch Offline service for its Huddl tablets in the run-up to Christmas.

If the buyout were to go through it would give Vodafone a foothold in the video streaming market to combat BT which is rumoured to be in talks to acquire Telefonica’s O2.

Vodafone declined to comment.

The news came as Tesco announced that chief customer officer Jill Easterbrook will also lead the business transformation programme. The changes also saw Chief executive David Lewis announce that he will run the day-to-day business in the UK operation on a temporary basis.

Lewis first hinted at the sale of the failed subsidiary in October as he reviewed the retailer’s £264m void in its finances.

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