Without enough content deals in place, Apple has scrapped plans to announce the service at a September event in San Francisco, which would have coincided with the beginning of the new network TV season. The company still plans to introduce a more powerful version of its Apple TV set-top box at the event, but the live TV service will have to wait until next year.
The main stumbling block in its talks with content providers is price, according to the report. Apple wants to offer a package of popular channels for USD 40 a month, the report said. That's roughly half of the average cable bill in the US.
In addition, Apple has encountered problems creating a content deliver network that will ensure a fast, glitch-free viewing experience throughout the US. Such a network requires storing content close to viewers, while Apple currently has data centres only in California, Nevada, North Carolina and Oregon. Apple has worked with Akamai for its iTunes services and is starting to build out more of its own capacity. Apple also is in talks with at least one operator of "micro data centres" that have popped up in areas far from content distributors' large data centres, Bloomberg said.
