Disney and Fubo are starting 2025 off with a bang. The two companies announced on Monday that they would be merging Fubo’s live TV streaming service with Hulu + Live TV, creating a new company majority-owned by Disney but operated by Fubo’s executive team. As part of the announcement, Fubo will create a new sports streaming service that will offer premium sports channels like ABC, ESPN, SEC Network, as well as programming from ESPN+.

Key Details:

• The new streamer will likely be quite similar to the Venu Sports joint venture from Disney, Fox, and Warner Bros. Discovery.
• Fubo had been in the midst of a lawsuit against the three companies over their refusal to allow it to create such a package.
• DIRECTV is also empowered to create smaller, themed channel packages thanks to its latest carriage deal with Disney.

According to the press release announcing the merger of Hulu + Live TV and Fubo, the latter will be allowed “to create a new Sports & Broadcast service, featuring Disney’s premier sports and broadcast networks including ABC, ESPN, ESPN2, ESPNEWS, and ESPNU, as well as ESPN+.”

Since many Fubo channel packages already include these channels, it’s safe to assume the new service will be a slimmed-down channel bundle that only offers sports-related networks. Disney tried to bring such a service to market along with Fox and Warner Bros. Discovery, lending its sports networks to the Venu Sports service that was brought to a screeching halt by an antitrust lawsuit from Fubo.

That lawsuit is now officially dead, as Fubo is withdrawing its complaint. Permission from Disney to package its channels in a sports-only service has been withheld for years, which was one of Fubo’s key arguments in its suit. Now that Disney will own 70% of Fubo as part of the merger, however, it has much less to fear from allowing Fubo to offer such a product. Fubo also reached settlements with Fox and WBD, but it was not revealed if those companies’ channels would also be permitted on this forthcoming “sports and broadcast service.”

Should another cable channel distributor try to revive the antitrust complaint against Disney, Fox, and WBD, they’ll likely have a much harder time making their case. Not only will Fubo be allowed to offer a sports-only package, but DIRECTV won the right to craft genre-specific channel bundles in its latest carriage battle with the House of Mouse. In short, there’s about to be a competitive marketplace for these sports-only streamers, more or less killing antitrust complaints.

Which other channels will be included in Fubo’s new service has not yet been revealed, but there will likely be others, potentially including regional sports networks. As it stands, the service will carry “Monday Night Football” games from the NFL, regular season and playoff games from the NBA and NHL, MLB contests, a wide selection of college football and basketball games, and thousands of other events that are currently only found on ESPN+.