Qwest investment in ZillionTV revealed

Legal documents made public as part of a lawsuit against online video player ZillionTV disclose that former Bell company Qwest Communications has made a $10 million investment in the firm, Multichannel News reports. The investment reportedly would give Qwest exclusive rights to market ZillionTV's service in Qwest's territory. However, ZillionTV's launch has met with several delays, and currently is planned for sometime in the second half of this year.

The investment is an interesting and fairly imaginative move by a telco that has sworn off any interest in rolling out its own IPTV service, though its choice of investing in the seemingly troubled ZillionTV over other firms is worth questioning. ZillionTV has aimed from the beginning to be a close partner to telcos, similar to the strategy of another online player, VUDU, which just became a Wal-Mart acquisition target. Verizon Communications and several other telcos reportedly have been planning to work with or test ZillionTV's offering.

For more:
- Multichannel News has this report

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