Sky Deutschland set for July 4 launch

German pay-TV operator Premiere will officially relaunch as Sky Deutschland on July 4 with four packages and six HD channels available to subscribers.

Sky Welt, a general entertainment package, will offer 20 channels including Sky Krimi, Fox and TNT Serie. Documentary channels Motorvision TV, Spiegel Geschichte, Discovery Channel, National Geographic Channel and National Geographic Wild will also be available, along with kids offerings the Disney Channel, Playhouse Disney, Jetix and Junior TV. The package will cost €16.90.

Once subscribed to Sky Welt, customers will be able to choose to add other packages from a choice of Sky Film, Sky Sport and Sky Fußball Bundesliga. In addition, Sky Welt Extra will be available as a bonus package to satellite customers choosing at least one additional premium package. Premiere said it will offer a greater variety of entertainment channels including History, the Biography channel, Romance TV, Kinowelt TV, Turner Classic Movies, MTV and ESPN America.

Sky Film will offer 10 channels, including eight Sky channels – Sky Cinema, Sky Action, Sky Comedy, Sky Emotion, Sky Nostalgie, Sky Cinema Hits and time-shift channels Sky Cinema +1 and Sky Cinema +24. The MGM Channel and Disney Cinemagic will complete the line-up.

The Sky Sport package will comprise of two channels covering a range of sports, including football, motor racing, golf, hockey, tennis, wrestling and extreme sports. All 146 games of the UEFA Champions League will be shown live and one game per Champions League matchday will be broadcast in HD. Sky Sport will also cover all 63 games of the DFB Cup live and exclusively along with matches from other European leagues including the English Premier League. Subscribers in Austria will also have access to an additional sports channel, which will broadcast all 378 games of the Austrian football league as well as games from the Austrian ice hockey and basketball leagues.

Sky Fußball Bundesliga will offer round-the-clock coverage of all Bundesliga and second division Bundesliga games live until at least 2013. Each weekend, the channel will offer over 20 hours of live action, with football legend Franz Beckenbauer leading the channel’s presenting talent.

Six high-definition channels will also be available from launch – Sky Cinema HD, Disney Cinemagic HD, Sky Sport HD, National Geographic HD, History HD and Discovery HD – which will be bundled together with relevant packages (Sky Cinema HD and Disney Cinemagic HD will be available to customers with the Sky Film package; and Sky Sport HD will be available to customers with either the Sky Sport or the Sky Fußball Bundesliga packages) for an additional €10 when taken with Sky Welt or Sky Welt plus Sky Film, Sky Sport or Sky Fußball Bundesliga. If subscribers take more than two packages (not including Sky HD) the HD package will cost an additional €5 per month.

Subscribers wishing to take Sky Welt, Sky Film, Sky Sport, Sky Fußball Bundesliga 
and Sky HD will be charged €59.99 per month.