Venu Sports, the joint venture between Disney, Fox and Warner Bros. Discovery, will charge $42.99 per month for its sports streaming service that's poised to launch this fall.
Officially disclosed Thursday, Venu hopes the price and service will appeal to its target audience of younger fans that don’t subscribe to traditional cable pay TV services but want a package that offers an array of sports in one place.
The Venu streaming service includes sports assets from the three entities, with access to 14 live sports channels and a library of on-demand content from the companies’ collective portfolios including ESPN+.
Linear networks available on the service include ESPN, ESPN2, ESPNU, SECN, ACCN, ESPNEWS, ABC, Fox, FS1, FS2, BTN, TNT, TBS, truTV, and ESPN+.
In announcing the price, Venu said programming is packaged around three pillars of content: live games and event coverage; sports studio shows and pre/post-game programming; and on-demand content such as ESPN’s 30 for 30 and Fox Sports Films documentary content.
In addition to live coverage of NFL, MLB, NHL, NBA, WNBA, NCAA football and basketball, the service will also feature PGA golf, soccer, Grand Slam tennis, INDYCAR, NASCAR and F1 auto racing and more.
“With an impressive portfolio of sports programming, Venu will provide sports fans in the U.S. with a single destination for watching many of the most sought-after games and events," said Pete Distad, CEO of the forthcoming Venu Sports service, in a statement. "We're building Venu from the ground up for fans who want seamless access to watch the sports they love, and we will launch at a compelling price point that will appeal to the cord cutter and cord never fans currently not served by existing pay TV packages."
The monthly price is lower than some earlier estimates that suggested the Venu service could cost around $50. At more than $40 per month, Venu comes in above most regional direct-to-consumer sports streaming services but is lower than that of most virtual MVPDs with full-fledged pay TV network lineups – like Hulu + Live TV, YouTube TV or Fubo – which are in the $73-$90 per month price range.
Venu plans to offer a 7-day free trial and anyone who subscribes at the $43 per month launch price will lock that in for 12 months from signup, with the ability to cancel at any time. The service plans to be offered direct-to-consumer via a new app, while also providing the ability to bundle the product, including with Disney+, Hulu or Max.
Earlier this year Fox CEO Lachlan Murdoch laid out some elements of the JV’s plan, estimating there are 50 million to 60 million households that don’t currently subscribe to a cable bundle. With that market, Murdoch in March said the companies “believe, a very high percentage of them that will be open to taking this new package,” and expected the service to attract 5 million subscribers within five years.
Although promising to bring some cohesion to a fragmented sports rights and viewing landscape, Venu Sports is not without its hurdles ahead of the planned launch. Debut of the service is still subject to regulatory sign offs and partners finalizing terms of definitive agreement.
And JV partner Warner Bros. Discovery was dealt a blow when the NBA rejected its matching offer to Amazon’s bid in the latest 11-year rights deals, which were awarded to NBCUniversal, Disney and Amazon Prime Video. WBD doesn’t believe the NBA had the right to reject its offer and is suing the league over language in its existing contract.
However, analyst Brett Sappington of Sappington Media has suggested it’s somewhat a lose-lose situation for WBD, where there’s a question about its ability to succeed in a legal battle, and even if it does, could result in souring relationships with the NBA.
Still, sans a legal intervention, WBD is left without key pro basketball sport rights that are now locked up for over a decade. Sappington and TVREV analyst Alan Wolk recently noted how the loss of NBA rights hampers WBD’s position in the Venu Sports streaming JV.
Wolk told STV that WBD needs those rights to make Venu “a viable app” and that WBD isn’t much of JV partner without the NBA. Sappington, meanwhile, noted other sports properties in WBD’s portfolio but said the company “won’t have as much influence” and possibly not as much share of the JV as a result of losing the NBA.
The JV also doesn’t include NBC, which secured its own NBA package including distribution on Peacock, nor sports from Paramount’s CBS.
Additionally, Venu and the JV entities face an ongoing lawsuit by sports-focused virtual MVPD Fubo, alleging they’ve engaged in years-long anticompetitive practices of stifling the service’s ability to compete, with the sports streaming JV the latest example. The vMVPD has asserted a launch of Venu “could cause irreparable harm to Fubo and to consumers.”