Disney CEO discusses ESPN streamer, demise of Venu Sports
Disney CEO discusses ESPN streamer, demise of Venu Sports
Bob Iger did his best to hype up the new ESPN streaming service Flagship while discussing Disney’s quarterly earnings with analysts.
The future looks bright for ESPN. The sports network and its sibling channels just had theirbest ratings month in a decade, and fans will soon have a new way to watch: a streaming service that will deliver all ESPN programming without a cable subscription. Disney is calling the streamer Flagship for now, and company CEO Bob Iger discussed the service, as well as the demise of the joint venture streamer Venu Sports while talking about Disney’s quarterly earnings report with analysts on Wednesday.
Key Details:
- Iger talked about the personalization and betting opportunities the new streamer would have.
- The CEO also said that Disney will take full advantage of new, skinny channel bundles available.
- Venu Sports was abandoned by its three originators because it quickly became “redundant,” according to Iger.
Iger was excited to talk about the future of ESPN on streaming, and said that Flagship would come with a “much bigger offering” than the linear channels in the ESPN family. He also sees it as an opportunity to bring a new, younger batch of fans to the network.
“It’s pretty clear that young viewers, or young consumers, are leaning more and more into streaming experiences, both fixed televisions on walls and mobile devices,” Iger said. “The more ESPN can be present for a new generation of consumers with a product that serves them really well, the better off ESPN businesses. So Flagship is not really designed to preserve a business. It’s designed to grow a business in a market that’s evolving or changing right before our eyes.”
He also reiterated comments he’s made in the past about the customization abilities of Flagship. Previous reports have indicated that Flagship will leverage artificial intelligence (AI) to create customized versions of “SportsCenter” for each subscriber. The streamer will include other features like integrated live odds and betting opportunities, fantasy data, advanced stats, and even ticketing and merchandise potential.
Iger also engaged in what might be considered revisionist history regarding the joint venture streamer Venu Sports. Disney joined with Fox and Warner Bros. Discovery to create Venu, a streamer intended to offer all the sports-themed channels owned by the three companies. Iger said that Disney and its partners abandoned Venu because the streamer had become “redundant” after new, smaller channel bundles built around sports channels from DIRECTV and Comcast were announced.
“We plan to take advantage of the emergence of these bundles because it is a great way to distribute ESPN,” Iger told analysts during the earnings conference call.
That comment represents a clear about-face from Disney regarding slimmed-down channel bundles. For years, Disney resisted the very idea of such packages, and forced cable distributors to include ESPN in their base plans, whether subscribers wanted to watch its sports programming or not. Faced with the destruction of Venu thanks to an antitrust lawsuit brought against the JV by Fubo, a cynic might say Disney’s sudden eagerness to join smaller channel bundles comes from the fact that it knew it wasn’t going to defeat Fubo in court.
Instead, Disney is set to merge its live TV streaming service Hulu + Live TV with Fubo and launch a new streaming plan, one which The Streamable assumes will be a smaller channel bundle similar to what Venu was intended to be. Combined with Flagship, Disney will be able to have its sports streaming cake and eat it, too.
ESPN Select
ESPN Select is a streaming service that replaced ESPN+ and provides access to live NHL, MLB, and MLS games, PGA Tour Golf, international sports events, ESPN original programming, and a complete archive of “30 for 30.” Find out our review of the service and how to start streaming ESPN Select.