Alistair Taylor | MIDiA Research

The Premier League going pay-per-view means a sucker-punch for sports fans

15 Oct 2020

English Premier League (EPL) clubs have agreed an ‘interim solution’ to allow fans to continue watching their teams live. EPL fixtures not selected for broadcast in October will be available to fans on a pay-per-view (PPV) basis.

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Q1 2020 UK Sports Betting Consumer Engagement Snapshot

Tim Mulligan and Alistair Taylor

October 2020

Netflix

iOS

android

This mini report is a review of trends and data on sports betting from Q3 2019 to Q1 2020 in the leading English-speaking markets of the US, UK, Canada, and Australia, with a focus on UK sports betters. MIDiA Research conducts quarterly surveys in key markets to gain insight into self-reported consumer trends in sports engagement through content, merchandise and fandom.

German Bundesliga faces 20% decline in value for its international rights

Alistair Taylor

1 Oct 2020

Bundesliga

premier league

EPL

German business publisher Sponsors has announced the German Football League (DFL) is facing a 20% decline in the total value of its overseas’ broadcast rights for the 2020/21 campaign. This is down from the €250 million ($292 million USD) that Bundesliga International (the league’s international sales operation) generated last year.

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DAZN 2019 Financials and Subscriber Deep Dive
Domestic Rights Key to Unlocking Audiences

Cover image for DAZN 2019 Financials and Subscriber Deep Dive

Alistair Taylor

September 2020

Sky

Financial Times

NFL

DAZN’s 2018 financials highlighted the difficulty in encouraging consumer adoption of a digital live sports proposition with a limited portfolio of sports rights. 2019 marked a year of consolidation and growth. DAZN learnt quickly that without premium domestic content it is difficult to penetrate competitive markets effectively.

European Professional Club Rugby goes OTT, pressing business over the needs of fans

Alistair Taylor

23 Sep 2020

EPCR

European Professional Club Rugby

OTT

Last Friday , European Professional Club Rugby (EPCR), the Heineken Champions Cup and the European Rugby Challenge Cup’s governing body announced the launch of its global over-the-top (OTT) streaming service, epcrugby.

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Creating the digital home of hockey - SportsPro Live panel

Alistair Taylor

17 Sep 2020

Video

Sports

Covid-19

Yesterday at SportsPro Live, I had the pleasure of moderating a panel discussing the creation of the digital home of hockey with Thierry Weil, International Hockey Federation (FIH)’s CEO and Jean-Luc Jezouin, SVP, Business Development at Nagra .

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Verizon Media announces platform to ‘evolve’ live streaming experience

Alistair Taylor

16 Sep 2020

Verizon

Verzion Media

Verizon Fios

Verizon Media announced a series of new Media Platform improvements in a press release today (16th September), intended to ‘evolve the live streaming experience’. These features are all aimed at increasing fan engagement following COVID-19’s detrimental impact on the overall viewing spectacle of live sports.

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DAZN financials: Growth reliant on premium domestic rights

Alistair Taylor

14 Sep 2020

DAZN

DAZN Group

Perform

DAZN’s 2018 financials highlighted the difficulty of encouraging a transition to consume live sports digitally with its existing portfolio of rights. DAZN has not yet released its 2019 financials, but MIDiA has constructed a robust and accurate subscriber and revenue model for the sport-centric streaming service which will be published in full as part of our DAZN Financials and Subscriber Deep Dive report.

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Snapshot
UK Q1 2020 Consumer Engagement for MMA and Boxing

Tim Mulligan and Alistair Taylor

September 2020

Audience Insight

Methodology This mini report is a review of trends and data established on MMA and boxing engagement from Q3 2019 to Q1 2020 in the leading English-speaking markets of the US, UK, Canada, and Australia. MIDiA Research fields quarterly brand tracker consumer surveys in key countries for insight data and aggregates 3rd party indicator data to track demand globally from Wikipedia and google searches, as well as social and critique sites.

Post-Pandemic Programming
Surviving and Thriving in the Recession

Cover image for Post-Pandemic Programming

Mark Mulligan, Tim Mulligan, Karol Severin, Alistair Taylor, Keith Jopling and Hanna Kahlert

September 2020

Apple

live

COVID-19 caused dislocation and disruption to the global entertainment business. Now, the recession and the prospect of further pandemic peaks have created an unprecedented outlook for entertainment companies. Many of the shifts that occurred during lockdown will define the new market dynamics.

Wanda Sports Group’s financials highlight long-term impact of live hiatus

Alistair Taylor

3 Sep 2020

sports fans

covid

live sports

Wanda Sports Group’s (WSG) Q2 financials highlight a significant decline in revenues on account of “the broad effects of COVID-19 mitigation efforts”. WSG reported a second successive quarter of decreasing revenues , following its disappointing Q1 results which saw a 26% year-on-year (YoY) decline attributed to losses within the Chinese company’s spectator sports and mass participation divisions.

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Recovery Economics
Post-Lockdown Sports

Alistair Taylor

August 2020

Disney

Comcast

Sky

As live sports resume following the coronavirus crisis lockdowns, the long-term impact of sports’ mass hiatus will be substantial. An activity gap created a void state for consumers, freeing up previously allocated attention and causing them to reconsider retaining subscriptions with diluted service offerings.

Can LiveScore learn valuable lessons from Eleven Sports’ UK failings?

Alistair Taylor

24 Aug 2020

streaming service

LiveScore

OTT

Streaming insurgent LiveScore launched its first ever over-the-top (OTT), ad-supported direct-to-consumer (D2C) streaming proposition in the UK back in June, harbouring a similar rights portfolio to that of Eleven Sports’ failed proposition back in 2018 .

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COVID fallout: BBC no longer considers UK Athletics value for money

Alistair Taylor

19 Aug 2020

Covid-19

covid

pandemic

COVID-19 exposed live entertainment as a vulnerable asset class , specifically following the pandemic-enforced postponement of live sports . One of the hardest hit during this hiatus and ensuing uncertainty has been athletics, which saw its largest engagement driver and the ‘greatest show on earth’ in the Olympic games postponed till 2021 .

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Fortnite’s Party Royale provides sports untapped avenue for reaching digital natives

Alistair Taylor

19 Aug 2020

Universal platform

Fortnite

Epic Games

Burgeoning universal platform Fortnite’s ‘ Party Royale ’ is slowly becoming the gateway for rights holders to reach digitally native audiences. Party Royale, Fortnite’s ‘ experimenta l’ game mode has been a breakthrough for the platform ever since it was released.

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Return of the fan: COVID-19 thwarts fan pilot sporting events amid regional spikes in cases

Alistair Taylor

6 Aug 2020

Video

Sports

Games

Just when sports fans thought it was safe to go back into the water, COVID reared its ugly head once more. UK fan pilot sporting events were all set to start allowing fans back into arenas and attend live events, but government restrictions have now been re-imposed to limit the spread of coronavirus, crippling any chances of normality resuming in the near-term.

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TwitchSports: Amazon throws sports into the starting line-up

Alistair Taylor

29 Jul 2020

Video

Sports

Games

Amazon-owned Twitch is no newcomer to sports. However, in a deliberate move to double down, Amazon has conceded that it needs to improve the discoverability of live sporting events for its platform users – so, as of last Wednesday, ‘Sports’ has become a standalone category with the return of Twitch.

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DAZN’s belated UK launch: Can it avoid Eleven Sports’ 'mistake’?

Alistair Taylor

24 Jul 2020

Video

Sports

Media & Marketing

DAZN, the anointed ‘Netflix of Sport’, has announced plans to resume launching its services globally via a beta service covering boxing bouts In July and August, for users who have registered their interest, free of charge, ahead of DAZN’s revamped imminent global rollout.

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Reach for the win: BT Sport to air UEFA Champions League final on YouTube

Alistair Taylor

23 Jul 2020

Video

Sports

Media & Marketing

UK pay-TV incumbent BT Sport has announced it will air this year’s (COVID-delayed) UEFA Champions League (UCL) final free-to-air (FTA) on Google-owned YouTube. YouTube’s head of sport in EMEA, Tomos Grace confirmed the move with SportsPro Media :“BT Sport have been amazing partners for YouTube and we’re very privileged to be working with them.

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NBCUniversal hopes to draw level with Premier League move

Alistair Taylor

15 Jul 2020

Video

Sports

Covid-19

With Comcast’s NBCUniversal-owned Peacock launching today (July 15th), sports fans will be excited ahead of NBCU’s repositioning of its English Premier League (EPL) rights, giving paying subscribers access to 175 fixtures for the 2020/2021 season on its over-the-top (OTT) streaming service.

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