HBO's prospects for picking up a new audience with a standalone streaming service are looking pretty good: about 17% of US broadband households are likely to subscribe to an over-the-top (OTT) video service from the premium cable net.

New Parks Associates video research finds among these likely subscribers, 91% are currently pay-TV subscribers, and roughly one-half would cancel their pay-tv service after subscribing to the HBO over-the-top service. Thus, an HBO OTT offering will create competitive challenges for all ecosystem players, including Netflix, Amazon, and pay-TV providers.

"HBO picked a good time to announce its standalone HBO Go OTT service in the US," said Glenn Hower, research analyst at Parks Associates. "The percentage of subscribers interested in OTT video services is trending upward, and more industry players are planning to launch their own OTT services."

For instance, DISH announced at CES 2015 that its OTT service, Sling TV, will include live TV such as CNN, ESPN, ESPN2, TNT, and TBS.

"Sports programming could be a major addition for standalone OTT services as sports is one of the primary reasons consumers elect to keep pay-TV services," Hower said.

From the article "Half of pay-TV subs with HBO OTT would cut the cord" by Michelle Clancy.

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