BSkyB CEO Jeremy Darroch made the announcement during an appearance on BBC. Though he did not disclose the company’s planned pricing structure, Darroch did say that the service would launch a film-on-demand service before branching out into sports broadcasting and other entertainment content.

   “This is the next chapter in our story and one we are very excited about,” said Darroch. “The Now TV service will be pay-as-you-go and OTT, meaning that the IPTV service will not require having a Sky contract or Sky hardware installed. About 13 million homes in the United Kingdom do not have access to paid content. So, our company saw an opportunity to broaden our growth through a variety of platforms and offer greater flexibility over how people watch TV. If we are going to keep growing, we need to appeal to people in different ways.”

   The launch of such a service was enabled by a more robust broadband structure that had emerged in the United Kingdom during the past few years, according to Darroch, who added that he wasn’t sure what kind of an impact the new service would have on the traditional BSkyB subscription model.

   “I will be watching the subscription figures,” he said. “The bottom line is that BSkyB had to look to new markets. We also are planning to commit more resources specifically to our entertainment offerings. We will spend about 600 million pounds ($949.5 million) by 2014 on commissioning and producing U.K.-based content, which is a 50 percent increase in our current spending over the next three years.”

   While Darroch said the company would primarily be focused on developing Now TV in the next few years, he reiterated BSkyB’s commitment to its recently launch 3-D sports content. “We’re seeing very good traction. The 3-D sports market is very healthy.”