As part of the deal Diva has secured digital and Pay TV rights to the critically acclaimed Hit Comedy Diggers and the award winning Thirller Boearderland. Diva will work with multiple Eastern European and Scandinavian VoD platforms to maximise the digital revenues of these pictures.

In this first of a series of deals Diva supplies five movies to MTG’s Pay TV platforms in Scandinavia and Eastern Europe. Going forward Diva will expand this framework to further business models and platforms within the MTG group of companies. For Diva this is the exciting beginning of a larger partnership with one of Europe’s leading media groups. Getting a first foothold in Eastern Europe is particularly exciting for Diva.

Diva is supplying Virgin with hand selected movies that meet one or more of the following criteria: they have a production budget exceeding EUR 3m, they have won multiple awards and they have a successful cinema release. Thankfully several of Diva’s movies fit the fold. The commercial results should be exciting considering the number of subscribers and the active marketing support Diva can give to drive sales through the Flimflex platform.

The partnership with Buenos Aires based C+D Latam was officially announced at the NexTV 2009 summit held last week. Through its parent company’s rich consulting background Diva’s new partner has access to prime partners in the region. With year on year VoD transaction growth more than doubling the 19 territory region offers an exciting growth prospect for Diva and its new partner.

The number of U.S. households with broadband access that watched full-length movies and TV shows online doubled in the past year, according to research firm, Parks Associates. According to the firm, 45 million households regularly watch either TV shows or films via the Internet. Big Champagne CEO Eric Garland, whose company tracks traffic on peer-to-peer sites--where most illegal file sharing occurs--told me recently that consumers are heading online for video entertainment and he doesn't expect them to return to their traditional viewing habits ever again. Garland's data shows that Hulu is the first legal Web service to snatch market share away from the pirate sites.