Blog: ESPN+

Read our latest daily deep dives, hot takes, and exciting updates about the entertainment world. Check out the latest insight from your favourite analyst, or search by coverage areas - music, entertainment and fandom, creator economy and social.

What the launch of the “Hulu for sports” platform means for Disney and for sports TV

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Tim Mulligan

7 Feb 2024

Hulu for sports

Today, ESPN (a Disney subsidiary), Fox, and Warner Bros Discovery announced : “...an understanding on principal terms to form a new joint venture (JV) to build an innovative new platform to house a compelling streaming sports service.

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Discovery enters streaming race with discovery+ and Olympics offering

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Alistair Taylor

9 Dec 2020

Last week , Discovery announced it will launch discovery+, ‘the definitive non-fiction’ subscription-video-on-demand (SVOD), on January 4th, 2021. Consumers in the US can expect the largest-ever content library for a new streaming service from launch, with more than 55,000 episodes from Discovery’s iconic brands such as the BBC’s Natural History collection, A&E Networks, Group Nine and more.

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

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Alistair Taylor

1 Oct 2020

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

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Alistair Taylor

19 Aug 2020

Universal platform

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

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Alistair Taylor

24 Jul 2020

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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NBCUniversal hopes to draw level with Premier League move

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Alistair Taylor

15 Jul 2020

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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FuboTV adds key sporting rights to portfolio following Disney deal

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Alistair Taylor

2 Jul 2020

Sporting rights

FuboTV, the US over-the-top (OTT) internet-delivered TV service launched back in January 2015 as a soccer-centric proposition. In that time it has established itself as a niche distributor of live streams of MLS and LatAm soccer matches to US, Canadian and Spanish audiences.

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Move Over Mickey, The NBA is Set to Become Disney World’s Star Attraction

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Alistair Taylor

27 May 2020

Australian Rules Football

COVID-19 forced sports leagues to think outside the box for restarting live sports. The UFC wanted to rent a private island , the NRL to ferry players to and from games, and the WWE performed to empty arenas .

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The Last Dance – ESPN Raining Threes

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Alistair Taylor

18 May 2020

With the pandemic-enforced postponement of live sports creating an entertainment void for sports fans, US broadcaster ESPN played its trump card to capitalise on the thirst for stimulating content during lockdown.

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Disney’s Results for Calendar Q1 Underlines The Importance Of its D2C Pivot

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Tim Mulligan

7 May 2020

There was no dressing it up. Disney had a bad start to the year from a financial perspective. In its Q2 2020 (calendar Q1 2020) report the company announced an 85% decline in income from its continuing operations before taxes, and an even greater 91% decline in net income from continuing operations.

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Forget Virtual – UFC and NRL going Remote

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Alistair Taylor

10 Apr 2020

Associated Press

With fans currently starved of sports entertainment during lockdown, rights holders are jumping out of the gate to be the first to put on live sports to serve any form of quick fix to see a jump in engagement.

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Self-Isolation: DAZN Concedes to COVID-19

Alistair Taylor

6 Apr 2020

additive services

all-encompassing offering

Sports streaming insurgent DAZN has announced last week it plans to inform rights holders of its intent to defer its payments of rights fees for any content not yet delivered (i.e. postponed / cancelled games) during this pandemic-enforced freeze on live sports.

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Tale of the tape: UFC or bundle driving ESPN+ adoption?

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Alistair Taylor

11 Feb 2020

Walt Disney’s pureplay sports streaming service ESPN+, which launched back in April 2018, has surpassed 7.6 million paid subscribers, Disney ’s chief executive Bog Iger reported during last week’s earnings call.

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Take Five (the big five stories and data you need to know) November 25th 2019

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Mark Mulligan

25 Nov 2019

Colin Kaepernick

Disney tidies its streaming stats: Disney is tidying up its streaming subscriber numbers in preparation for reporting the performance so far of Disney+. In the shake-up, ESPN falls from 3.4 million to three million while Hulu goes from a 28.

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Disney+ Recovers From Initial Blunder to Surpass 10 Million Sign Ups on Debut!

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Alistair Taylor

14 Nov 2019

21st Century Fox

all-encompassing offering

AppleTV+. Market saturation

Disney claims unexpected traffic on its newly-launched service was at fault for the buffering and technical issues of Disney+’s launch Tuesday . The issues highlight just how difficult it is transitioning from a media company to a tech player, with technical glitches an enormous issue for digital-native subscribers.

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Could a Recession Change the Tide for Sports Rights Allocation?

Cover image for Could a Recession Change the Tide for Sports Rights Allocation?

Alistair Taylor

24 Sep 2019

additive services

all-encompassing offering

Revenue remains rights holder’s priority qualifier for allocating rights. However, with an impending recession, we are likely nearing an inflection point whereby rights holders may start to look towards prioritising reach over revenue.

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The Mouse That Roared; Disney Calls Time on Traditional Pay-TV and Netflix in the US

Cover image for The Mouse That Roared; Disney Calls Time on Traditional Pay-TV and Netflix in the US

Tim Mulligan

7 Aug 2019

As predicted , Disney has decided to flip the switch and unleash a pay-TV (and Netflix) killer by announcing a Q4 bundle of its streaming services in one joint aggressively-priced offer. On November 12 th , 2019 when Disney launches its new direct-to-consumer (D2C) service Disney+, it will be possible to subscribe to a bundled version of Disney+, ESPN+ and Hulu’s ad-supported tier all in one offering for $12.

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Is YouTube MLB’s Answer to Tap into Younger Audience?

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Alistair Taylor

29 Jul 2019

cable consumption

On July 18 th , Google-owned YouTube livestreamed the first of its exclusive Major League Baseball (MLB) matches, acquired through a partnership announced with the MLB at the end of April 2019 . YouTube’s first exclusive live game distribution deal with the MLB covers 13 games during the second half of the MLB’s 2019 regular season.

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Sports and the Tech Majors: A Competitive Partnership

Cover image for Sports and the Tech Majors: A Competitive Partnership

Hanna Kahlert

8 Jul 2019

Amazon Prime Instant Video

d-day for sporting rights

We’re pleased to announce the launch of our Sports research practice. The Sports vertical provides comprehensive global analysis of the key players unleashing disruption in the business of sport broadcasting, streaming and e-sports alongside detailed and segmented analysis of consumer engagement by service.

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Why the UFC Wants to Replicate the Yao Ming effect

Alistair Taylor

25 Jun 2019

audience culture

The NBA is the third highest grossing league globally, generating $7.4 billion in 2017, behind domestic rivals MLB and NFL. Whereas the MLB and NFL have largely struggled to entice a truly global following, the NBA have become synonymous with Chinese sports fans, and offers a template for the Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) to grow its international fanbase.

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