Warning: Many Disney owned TV channels will stop broadcasting in Vietnam and SE Asia from October 1st

A woman uses a pay TV service in Vietnam. Photo by VnExpress/Luu Quy

Fox Movies, Fox Sports, and Nat Geo People are among channels that will stop broadcasting on pay television services in Vietnam from October.

According to e.vnexpress.net, the Department of Radio, Television and Electronic Information under the Ministry of Information and Communications, quoted an announcement from the management company of these channels as saying the suspension would take place across Southeast Asia and Hong Kong.

No more Fox Channels

The channels that will no longer be available in Vietnam include two channels of Buena Vista International: Disney Channel and Disney Junior, and 12 channels of Disney Networks Group Asia Pacific: Fox, Fox Movies, Fox Family Movies, Fox Action Movies, Fox Life, Fox Crime, Fox Sports, Fox Sports 2, Fox Sports 3, FX, Channel V, and National Geographic People.

All of them are now owned by Disney after the company acquired Fox.

Netflix v Disney battle ahead

According to a representative of a pay TV service in Vietnam, stopping broadcasting in Southeast Asia could be part of Disney's strategy to entice users to use Disney Plus services to compete with its rival Netflix.

The Department of Radio, Television and Electronic Information said the right to provide the 14 foreign program channels on pay TV services in Vietnam is valid until the end of Sept. 30 and the broadcast will be stopped from Oct. 1.

The department has already sent a statement requesting service providers to supply a timely notification plan to ensure subscriber interests.

Phan Thanh Gian, director of ClipTV, said the suspension of some channels had in fact started in May on the over-the-top television system (meaning any streaming service that delivers content over the internet), and would be applied to all 14 channels mentioned above across all platforms by October.

There is currently no information on the distribution of the 14 channels in Southeast Asia after Oct. 1. According to an insider, users of pay TV services would likely be replaced by some other channels, but there are no specific plans yet.