Congress Demands More Answers from Venu Sports Officials After ‘Insufficient’ Details Provided
Congress Demands More Answers from Venu Sports Officials After ‘Insufficient’ Details Provided
Congressmen Joaquin Castro and Jerry Nadler have more questions for Disney, Fox, and Warner Bros. Discovery.
The fine folks at Venu Sports are going to have to do better if they want to allay congressional fears about their forthcoming joint venture sports streaming service. Late last week, Representatives Jerry Nadler and Joaquin Castro sent Disney, Fox, and Warner Bros. Discovery a new letter with additional questions about the live TV streaming platform that the three companies are trying to establish, confirming reports that they were unsatisfied with the first round of answers they got from the media giants about Venu. The congressmen put seven new questions in the letter, seeking more details on how the product would impact consumers and the larger pay-TV ecosystem.
Key Details:
- The new letter states Disney, Fox, and WBD have offered little but “vague assurances” so far.
- It requests details on how the Venu Sports monthly price will be determined, and when it will be announced.
- The companies have until June 21 to respond to Reps. Castro and Nadler.
The new communication from Capitol Hill praises Disney, Fox, and WBD for their “prompt reply and willingness to meet with our staff” after the initial information request letter from Reps. Nadler and Castro in April, but doesn’t offer much else in the way of praise for how transparent the three companies have been about Venu Sports thus far.
“Overall, we still have not received answers about the firewalls your companies may implement to prevent collusion; the precautions you may take to ensure consumer privacy; or the methods you may use to determine pricing of the new service,” the congressmen say in their new letter.
The representatives say that the first round of information-seeking yielded little more than “vague assurances” and “contradictory” answers to questions about pricing, concerns about competition, the sharing of proprietary information, and other topics. The letter drills down into specifics about what Congress wants to know before feeling more comfortable with the service’s place in the industry. The Department of Justice is to be sent a copy of the answers given to Congress, as it decides whether to move forward on a probe of Venu Sports for potential antitrust violations.
What Does Congress Want to Know This Time?
Reps. Castro and Nadler had seven additional questions for Disney, Fox, and WBD regarding Venu Sports. The topics range from when the price of the streamer will be announced and how it will be determined to how the companies will keep from colluding on other streaming projects by providing each other with sensitive information that has nothing to do with Venu Sports. Disney, for example, cannot give WBD a heads-up prior to raising prices on Disney+ or Hulu so that it can make a similar price adjustment on Max, and Congress wants to make sure those boundaries stay in place.
The expected fall launch of Venu is creeping closer, and there is still much we don’t know about the service. Many analysts, including myself, have predicted that the price of Venu will fall between $40 and $50 per month, and Fox CEO Lachlan Murdoch said in March that the cost would likely settle in the “higher” range of estimates.
In their first letter responding to Congress, the three companies promised that they would continue to act and operate as independent companies, seeking out their own sports deals separately and competing with each other for rights without resorting to unlawful collusion.
“Our respective companies will remain separate and independent and will continue to negotiate separately and independently with each distributor, including this new platform, regarding the carriage terms for each respective network,” the companies told Congress. “Nothing in the JV changes how we each negotiate carriage of our programming with other distributors.
“Our companies are aware of our legal obligations and are committed to structuring the new service in a manner that is pro-consumer and in accordance with all relevant laws and regulations.”
Venu Sports will offer livestreams of 14 channels that carry live sporting events, including cable networks like FS1 and ESPN as well as broadcast channels such as ABC and Fox, as well as all content from the ESPN+ streaming platform. It also faces a legal challenge from Fubo, which was sent into an existential crisis by Venu’s creation and believes the service constitutes a clear enough antitrust violation to sue.
Venu Sports
Venu Sports was the planned live TV streaming service that would offer sports from ESPN, ESPN2, ESPNU, SECN, ACCN, ESPNEWS, ABC, FOX, FS1, FS2, BTN, TNT, TBS, and truTV. Programming from ESPN+ and on-demand content would also be available, as would broadcasts of NFL, NBA, MLB, and NCAA games. However, in January 2025, after Fubo and Hulu + Live TV officially merged, Venu’s launch was put on hold thanks to a preliminary injunction. It was only a few days later that the joint venture was officially shut down for good.