Apple set to launch Netflix-style streaming service

Apple is expected to launch a slew of new products at its Cupertino headquarters in California on Monday, including a Netflix competitor, a revamped news service and a subscription-based gaming offering.

The event, to be hosted at the Steve Jobs theatre on campus, will herald a new era for the iPhone maker as it enters the fast-growing global content streaming market. "Apple has been looping a video from the theatre, teasing its focus on television," reports The Verge.

The livestreaming video is stylised to look like a television set, and has been switching between a handful of different angles of the Steve Jobs theatre. Apple has invested over $1 billion into making new content and the streaming service is set to compete with the giants including Amazon, Netflix and Hulu.

"The company is building a new content store focused on offering bundles with cable services like HBO, Showtime and Starz. Put more simply, Apple may be looking to disrupt cable TV by essentially becoming a cable TV provider," adds the report.

Apple has been working on developing original content like "Amazing Stories" by Steven Spielberg; crime show "Are You Sleeping?" produced by Reese Witherspoon and starring Octavia Spencer; "Calls" which is an adaptation of a French short-form series; "Central Park" which is an animated musical comedy from Loren Bouchard and "Defending Jacob" -- a thriller adapted from William Landay's novel, starring Chris Evans, among others.

According to TechCrunch, another Apple project is "Shantaram" -- a series based on the novel by Gregory David Robert, about a man who escapes from an Australian prison and ends up in Bombay (now Mumbai). There is also an untitled M. Night Shyamalan series and untitled Oprah Winfrey projects, among others.