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New Fetch TV Mini & Mighty Set Top Boxes A Serious Threat To Foxtel

Fetch TV is one of those Companies that has slowly crept up on Foxtel, now they have their hands around the neck of the big pay TV provider who is reeling from poor set top box decision making and a fall in real growth.

For the last two weeks ChannelNews and SmartHouse has been playing with two new set top boxes from Fetch TV. Both these boxes are available from JB Hi Fi and Harvey Norman as of today.

The new Fetch TV Mini and Mighty set top boxes have the same OS and both are extremely fast and unlike the latest Foxtel iQ3 don’t stall, lag or freeze when you are trying to switch between channels, recording content or when switching to video on demand services.

Many years ago I was responsible for AVIS PR this was a Company that coined the phrase “We Try Harder” at the time they were #2 to Hertz. Today they are #1 because they delivered the products and the service that consumers came to trust, now Fetch TV is the small kid on the block who is seriously kicking Foxtel where it really hurts. 

In 2016 Fetch TV is doing exactly what Avis did back in the 1980’s with the Company now piling on subscribers due to word of mouth marketing and above all the delivery of a great entertainment experience when consumers start using the Fetch TV offering.

Fetch TV are growing their subscription numbers by partnering with carriers such as iiNet, and Optus who are currently investing serious amounts of money into content including sport such as the UK Premier League which Optus took off Foxtel.

Where Fetch TV differs is that is primarily about entertainment something that has not gone unnoticed by the likes of HBO who Foxtel are currently trying to woo for the Australian market.record-tv-easy

They are already seen as a key Netflix partner and they are now delivering access to Presto, Stan plus new linear channels from Viacom including  Comedy Central and Spike which is best known for MMA.

The big difference is that while Foxtel is delivering hundreds of channels, many of which only attract small amounts of viewers Fetch TV is delivering access to a lot of relevant content and above all an excellent choice of SVOD services.

According to Fetch TV management the Company has seen a “massive explosion in new subscribers” as a direct result of Optus bundling the Fetch TV offering with their top end broadband bundle.

ChannelNews understands that during the past 4 months Fetch TV who has 400,000 paying subscribers has attracted over 80,000 new customers during the past few months and is confident that they can grow their base to 600,000 subscribers by the end of the year.Capture

The new Mighty is capable of delivering 4K content such as the several excellent TV series now being shot and delivered by Netflix.

While these are the best set top boxes we have ever tested, the good news is that they both will shortly get a major software update with the delivery of a new intuitive Interface.
(Separate Reviews on each box will appear this week).

With the Mighty there’s space for up to 585 hours of SD recordings on the 1 terabyte hard drive.

With both the Mini and Mighty owners can also easily record a whole series and by using the ‘Series Tag’ feature you can automatically record every episode of your favourite shows.

This content is saved in separate folders, and sorted by series and episode number so they’re easy to find when you’re ready to watch.

A pause and rewind feature means if you miss something you can simply stop, rewind and play it again. There is also a 7 Day Guide. Presto-on-Fetch-UI1-850x478

With both boxes owners will be able to watch Premier League Soccer live unlike Foxtel that has had to resort to delayed telecasts of selected Premier League games syndicated by only a few of the Premier League Clubs who have the rights to their own home and away games.

The difference between the latest Foxtel iQ3 box and what’s on offer from Fetch TV is chalk and cheese.

For example, I am on my third iQ3 box and even now my latest iQ3 box is constantly freezing, or when I have recorded a show it starts playing a different show than what has been recorded.

It also sticks on a previously recorded show so for example if you start watching a recorded show and you suddenly change your mind and go to another show. It starts by showing you the details for the show you want to watch but when you hit the play button it starts to replay the previous show.

In comparison the processor power and the superior OS software used by Fetch TV eliminates a lot of the problems that are plaguing the Telstra and News Corporation owned Foxtel. With the Fetch TV Mini and Mighty Menus pop open right away and your content is on the screen instantly.

In the past the larger Fetch TV box has only been sold by Harvey Norman as of today both the Mighty and Mini are available outright at JB HI Fi.

The Fetch TV Mini retails at $149. It is worth noting that Fetch TV comes with its own subscription costs if you opt for the additional channels.

The Mighty has a recomended retail price of $399

The Entertainment Pack (37 additional channels) costs $15 per month and each special interest channels (sport and world) can cost anywhere between $2.00 and $49.95 per month.



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