DAZN buying BT Sports back on it seems

They have the Women's Champions League.

That's just as good as the Men's Champions League. You're not allowed to say otherwise.

 

Surely the only way DAZN can survive is to start bidding for contracts when they come up, FA cup, Champions league etc, don't fancy their chances much. BT/Discovery, Sky and even Amazon will have a lot to say.

"Game over"

 

Already posted as a tweet by @TBC-ASAP but just to restate that the BT / Discovery JV is now a legit story, not a rumour.

https://www.londonstockexchange.com...ive-negotiations-to-create-sports-jv/15313658

Sounds like there is still a bit of a way to go, but they wouldn't have gone public with this unless talks were pretty advanced.

Definitely a blow to DAZN in the UK for the short to medium term. They'll have to try and grab rights as they become available rather than get the "Big Bang" and immediate customer base that BT would have sold them.

 

Wow!

That's a huge blow to DAZN.

There was a board meeting yesterday. Guardian report written before the discovery news.

https://www.theguardian.com/football/2022/feb/02/bt-final-stage-premier-league-rights-dazn-discovery#aoh=16438810439489&csi=0&referrer=https://www.google.com&amp_tf=From %1$s&ampshare=https://www.theguardian.com/football/2022/feb/02/bt-final-stage-premier-league-rights-dazn-discovery

If DAZN being honest then I think they saw that for them to take over all them BT sport TV contracts it would mean subscription prices would need to increase dramatically for them to make money.

https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.th...s-exclusive-talks-with-discovery-on-bt-sports

 

12 years to late.

 

Why whats wrong?

DAZN and BT couldnt agree the value and terms. The option with DAZN was to keep the price competitive and no more than the price of DAZN Italy and Germany. There were five tv rights that DAZN were interested in taking from BT, BT were adamant they had to take all rights which didnt make the price point work. Two of them are out of contract this year.

The crown jewel of the premier league rights are back to tender in 2 years and the value of the bids are expected to reduce by 20-25%. DAZN have decided to walk away focus on other rights and territories and will be back to the table when the rights become available. They are hear long term, I expect the focus to turn to Australia, Mexico and Asia will become the shorter term focus

 

Only initial competitor is Amazon, whose streaming service is not their priority its an add on value. Amazon have economies of scale like DAZN. It will be a long term grow, 2 of the rights DAZN wanted from BT become available this year.

 

Which ones are they after? is Champions league one?

 

BT sport hold the rights till 2024. Cost them £1.2 billion

 

I'm not sure that 2 years is 'short term'. What happens in Australia or Mexico is really of zero interest and relevance to UK fans paying for DAZN who now, and also for the foreseeable future in the UK offer nothing other Eddie Hearn's Matchroom stable each domestic card being a 7.99 PPV.

That's the cold hard facts of it. Who on this board and in the UK cares what DAZN offer in Germany and how much it costs?

If you look at the 7.99 per month, as far as their UK operation they will be losing massive amounts of money on the cards they have done which is being subsidized by revenue coming in from other markets where they have more sports on offer and a bigger revenue. Then again, what has it cost them to get that bigger revenue elsewhere and ultimately when/how will they ever become profitable?

Their subscriber base is also vastly exaggerated. The 'oh most people don't bother cancelling' argument always makes me laugh. You can literally cancel at the click of a mouse button. So why wouldn't people cancel, that's nonsense.

DAZN continuing a boxing only service in the UK for 7.99 per month is extremely niche offering. It's only sustainable long term by 1- securing PL rights (no sign of that for 2 years and even then debatable) or 2- DAZN being content to lose money in the UK for years and effectively subsidize Eddie Hearn long term with no clear end date in sight.

 

I very much doubt DAZN deciding not to buy BT has any bearing on Eddie's very lucrative contract .

 

What's the deal with UFC? How long has BT got the contract for that? It might make the subscription more palatable if DAZN had the rights, at least there would be regular live events.