Blockbuster – the once dominant, now prehistoric video rental company where you used to rack up incredible late fees (and anger towards their employees) – is not only still kicking, but seems to be positioning itself for a 21st century “comeback” of sorts via a new partnership with Motorola. Talk about two companies who could use some new-found success (read: brick-and-mortar / RAZR).
The exclusive deal aims to further “Blockbuster’s digital strategy by providing its library of premium digital entertainment to mobile devices for the first time.”
More specifically:
Through the agreement select Motorola phones will feature an exclusive BLOCKBUSTER OnDemand application, providing on-the-go download access to Blockbuster’s digital library of thousands of current BLOCKBUSTER OnDemand movies.
The agreement will also further Blockbuster’s multi-channel vision of eventually enabling customers to use the Company’s BLOCKBUSTER OnDemand application with multiple consumer electronics and portable devices, such as PCs, portable media players, Blu-ray Disc players, personal video recorders (PVRs), set-top boxes, mobile phones and Web-connected TVs, to search Blockbuster’s entire catalog of entertainment content and download available titles for rent or purchase, schedule movies for mail delivery through BLOCKBUSTER Online((R)), or reserve titles for in-store pick-up at participating BLOCKBUSTER(R) stores or at a BLOCKBUSTER Express(TM) branded vending machine.
This sounds like a pretty decent idea, but will depend entirely on how well it works in meatspace. Both the quality of the streaming movie files and that of Motorola’s handsets will play significant roles in the success of Blockbuster Mobile.
More importantly, competition is always a good thing. Hopefully this will motivate the likes of Netflix and HTC (or any handset manufacturers for that matter) to put a quality streaming application alternative into the market.