Viacom, owner of Paramount Pictures, is uniting forces with Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer and Lionsgate to provide consumers with a premium television channel that will show originally produced television series and movies, both classics and new.

Watch out HBO and Showtime, there’s a new player in the game! Paramount Pictures, MGM and Lionsgate are joining forces to launch a premium TV and movie channel that will combine both originally produced television shows and films from the studios’ extensive collections, exclusively provided.

The daring project is expected to launch in autumn 2009, the companies said in a statement on Sunday. The move is seen as a direct challenge to CBS’s Showtime Networks, which MGM and Lionsgate still have contracts with for screening movies. These expire at the end of 2008. Paramount’s contract with Showtime ended in 2007 and was not renewed.

Viacom will take the largest share of the new joint venture. No further financial details were released.

“I have stated from the beginning that Viacom and CBS have the right to pursue their own strategic objectives in the best interest of their individual shareholders,” Sumner Redstone, majority owner of Viacom, said in an e-mailed statement to Reuters.

“Competition between the two companies hones their skills and their productivity.”

Redstone also owns CBS. Viacom, which owns the Paramount film studio and MTV Networks, and CBS were split in 2006 to appeal to different classes of shareholders.

The new channel will reportedly feature recent movies such as “Iron Man,” “Shutter Island” or “GI Joe,” but will also include film classics like “Braveheart,” “Forrest Gump,” the “Godfather” franchise from Paramount, the “James Bond” franchise from MGM, as well as the “Rocky” and “Pink Panther” franchises, and many others.

Analysts says US households are watching fewer feature films. Nielsen ratings say the numbers of households watching films first shown in the cinema at home have fallen 80 percent since 2001.

Some factors are the availability of DVDs, online downloading or an on-demand service that offers them before they become available on pay-TV.

Viacom President Philippe Dauman hopes the new premium channel can capitalize on this.

“We can provide a lot more ways to provide what consumers want, whether it's broadband opportunities, maximizing video-on-demand opportunities and high definition,” he said.

The venture will have its own management team, headed by a chief executive. Viacom also announced that its MTV Networks division would provide promotional services for the new channel.