Online retailer Amazon has signed a multi-year licensing with Hollywood studio partnership Epix to add 3,000 movies to Amazon’s video streaming library for its Prime Instant Video customers.
The move ahead of the launch a new version of its Kindle tablet, will give a boost to Amazon’s video subscription service and stand the company in good steam to compete with the existing streaming service players like Netflix and Apple.
Epix is a joint venture between Viacom, its Paramount Pictures unit, Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Studios and Lionsgate.
The deal will cover movies from all Epix owned studios and will expand the number of titles on the Prime Instant Video service to over 25,000.
Amazon Prime Instant Video subscribers will have access to movies that include The Avengers, Iron Man 2, The Hunger Games, Transformers Dark of the Moon, Thor and Rango as well as Kick Ass, Paranormal Activity 2, True Grit, The Lincoln Lawyer, and Justin Bieber Never Say Never.
Amazon vice president of video and music Bill Carr said that the company is investing hundreds of millions of dollars to expand the Prime Instant Video library for its customers.
"We have now more than doubled this selection of movies and TV episodes to over 25,000 titles in just under a year," Carr said.
Epix is also negotiating with several other companies including Apple, Google and Hulu about ways they could use its selection of movies.
Recently, Netflix ended its exclusivity agreement with Epix but will keep all the television channel’s movies on its service through September 2013.
Since 2010, Netflix has been paying $200m a year for exclusive rights to Epix movies and has the option to extend its deal through September 2014
