Posts for 'Fox'

First up on this week’s podcast we discuss Fubo CEO David Gandler’s statement that the company is in a “duel to the death” with Spulu, the new sports JV from Disney, WBD and Fox. He makes a good point that if the 3 companies allow the JV access to their sports networks without requiring the JV to also pay for non-sports networks as companies do with typical pay-TV deals, this would put the JV at a cost advantage compared to pay-TV operators like Fubo.

Next, Variety reported Apple spent $700 million on just 3 movies last year, a bet that Colin and I both believe is far too concentrated for a streaming service that is struggling with high churn and badly needs catalog depth. Finally, both Max and Disney+ are trying to emulate Netflix in cracking down on password sharing and on improving churn. Can they catch up with the clear market leader?

Finally, all the session videos from last week’s VideoNuze CTV Advertising PREVIEW: 2024 virtual are available.

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Late yesterday, Comcast made its $65 billion all-cash offer for key Twenty-First Century Fox assets official. The offer sets up a bidding war with Disney, which had already struck a cash and stock deal with Fox. My guess is that Comcast is going to end up prevailing and the bidding will actually be less heated than many expect. There are many dimensions to this drama, but here are 5 quick reactions I have.

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I’m pleased to present the 405th edition of the VideoNuze podcast, with my weekly partner Colin Dixon of nScreenMedia.

This week we dig into Fox’s newly announced deal to broadcast NFL Thursday Night Football games for the next 5 years. The price was reportedly $3 billion, which translates to an average of $60 million per game, a 30% increase vs. what CBS and NBC paid last season.

Sports have long been thought of as TV’s firewall, but given the NFL’s own ratings declines, combined with accelerating changes in viewers’ behaviors, cord-cutting and adoption of ad-free SVOD, this deal carries risks for Fox. Can Fox turn a profit on the games as pay-TV operators push back on rate increases and advertisers balk at smaller audiences? Will we see a direct-to-consumer streaming service emerge? Time will tell.

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Also note, Colin has a new white paper out on content portability in the EU. Download it here.

Fox will have broadcast rights to NFL Thursday Night Football for the next 5 years in a deal that is reportedly worth over $3 billion. That would work out to an average of $60 million per game, up from the $45 million NBC and CBS paid per game over the past 2 years and up from the $37.5 million CBS alone paid in 2014 and 2015. The broadcasts will be presented by Bud Light.

The deal gives fresh credence to the idea that “live sports are TV’s firewall” against changing viewer behaviors and the rise of SVOD. The “firewall” concept has been around for years now and has driven the exorbitant rise in sports rights and the multi-billion dollar “sports tax” that pay-TV subscribers who are not sports fans pay each year.

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I’m pleased to present the 390th edition of the VideoNuze podcast with my weekly partner Colin Dixon of nScreenMedia.

First up this week, we discuss the impact of the “Star Trek: Discovery” launch on CBS All Access. CBS has said that All Access daily subscriber growth is up 200% over last year since the show’s launch. As Colin notes though, it’s hard to draw conclusions yet about how sustainable the additions will be or whether churn will spike. More originals are clearly needed to broaden the service’s appeal.

We then turn to the surprising news this week that YouTube TV will be the presenting sponsor of the 2017 World Series. Colin and I agree it’s really a sign of the times when a skinny bundle has stepped up this way. However, since Fox, the network broadcasting the games, isn’t even available yet on YouTube TV in half the top 50 U.S. markets, the sponsorship carries risks. Colin also notes that given YouTube TV’s programming costs, it is likely losing money for each new subscriber.

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YouTube TV, the skinny bundle launched earlier this year by YouTube, will be the presenting sponsor of the 2017 World Series on Fox. Take a moment to digest that: the iconic World Series won’t be presented by a beer or soda company, an automobile or truck manufacturer or a wireless carrier. Instead it will be a skinny bundle!

The sponsorship includes national TV spots, on-air call outs during each game, branding on MLB’s digital properties and social media accounts, plus in-stadium promotion and MLB players competing in postseason promotional events. YouTube creators will also produce behind-the-scenes content. And select fans will get VIP access at the games themselves. The value of the deal wasn’t disclosed, but surely runs to 7 or 8-figures.

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I'm pleased to present the 176th edition of the VideoNuze podcast with my weekly partner Colin Dixon of nScreenMedia. In the past 2 weeks, Aereo has touched off an escalating war of words between it, the broadcast TV industry and other interested parties. Today Colin and I review some of the recent back-and-forth in this battle.

News Corp. COO Chase Carey kicked things off in remarks at the NABShow last week, threatening to move Fox to cable if Aereo was deemed legal. CBS and Univision later backed him. This week broadcasters petitioned for the Second Circuit Court of Appeals to hold a full or "en banc" review of their decision, a strategy my colleague Howard Homonoff suggested they could pursue in a contributed piece on Tuesday. In the petition, broadcasters stated that "unless reversed, (the court's prior decision for Aereo) would wreak commercial havoc" on the  industry.

For its part, Aereo took the extraordinary step of taking out a full page ad in the NY Times on Tuesday, in which it said "54 million Americans use some sort of antenna to watch TV." Aereo is appealing directly to consumers, essentially trying to paint the broadcasters as stifling innovation and being anti-consumer. Aereo CEO Chet Kanojia also said this week that broadcasters would face a serious policy fight if they tried switching to cable.

Last but not least, the dispute got personal as well, as Leo Hindery, a former cable executive, and now media industry investor, called Aereo lead investor Barry Diller's involvement "despicable" and "tawdry." That was after he labeled Aereo a "pissant little company" that is stealing copyrighted material because it's not paying retransmission consent fees.

All of this over a company that hasn't yet even demonstrated its value proposition resonates with consumers! Imagine what happens if/when it does.

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(Apologies in advance, Colin's audio isn't very good this week.)

I'm pleased to be joined once again by Colin Dixon, senior partner at The Diffusion Group, for the 139th edition of the VideoNuze-TDG Report podcast.

Breaking with tradition, we're posting this week's podcast a day early to share our thoughts on Aereo's big legal victory - the decision by U.S. District Judge Judith Nathan to deny the broadcast networks' request for a preliminary injunction to block Aereo's service. As Colin and I agree, though the broadcasters have promised to pursue an appeal, for now it's a very significant milestone for Aereo, as it validates the company's assertion that the Cablevision precedent should hold.  

Our discussion focuses on the ruling's implications. Certainly it opens up a whole new option for pay-TV operators to avoid paying hundreds of millions in retransmission consent fees by either partnering with Aereo or developing comparable technology (patent issues notwithstanding) to deliver broadcast programs. It also opens up opportunities for OTT providers to potentially beef up their services in partnership with Aereo. While Colin sees Aereo as offering some benefits for the broadcasters, I view the ruling as key setback to their strategy to develop a secondary revenue stream.

The ruling also comes in the context of two other significant developments - the decision by DirecTV to drop Viacom's networks and the news that Netflix's usage surpassed 1 billion hours in June. Both underscore the impact that evolving consumer behaviors are having on the relationship between pay-TV and online video delivery. The Aereo decision scrambles that dynamic even further. No question, we are living in very interesting times.

Listen in to hear all of the details.

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