Does Fox Trademark Application Reveal Name of Its Sports Streaming Joint Venture With Disney, WBD?
A new trademark filing by Fox could reveal the intended name of the service that observers have dubbed ‘Spulu’ for lack of a better name.
So long, Spulu? Media analysts have adopted that moniker — a portmanteau of Sports and Hulu — for the joint venture sports streaming platform being developed by Disney, Fox, and Warner Bros. Discovery, as a way to nod to its three-way ownership structure which is similar to the arrangement used by Hulu when it first launched. This week, Fox CEO Lachlan Murdoch revealed to the public that the service does indeed have a name, though he declined to disclose what that name actually will be. But a new report indicates that Fox has filed to trademark the name of its Australian sports streaming services in the United States, which could point to the name for the JV, or indicate that Fox is planning to bring another sports streaming option to the U.S. market.
Key Details:
- Fox has filed a trademark application for “Kayo” and “Kayo Sports” in the United States.
- Kayo is an Australian sports streamer, the majority of which is owned by Fox’s parent company News Corp.
- Fox does not currently give U.S. cord-cutters and cord-nevers a way to watch all of its sports outside of cable.
New York Times and Washington Post contributor Michael Greshko revealed on X (the social media site formerly known as Twitter) that Fox has filed for a U.S. trademark for the terms “Kayo” and “Kayo Sports.” The brand is already an established sports streaming platform in Australia, and is majority-owned by News Corp., Fox’s parent company. The timing of the filing against the backdrop of Murdoch’s comments suggesting that the three companies had settled on a name for their JV has caused speculation in industry circles that the Kayo brand will be imported specifically for the American sports platform.
As of August 2023, Kayo Sports had 1.4 million subscribers. First launched in 2018, and top sports offered on the platform include soccer, rugby, horse racing, cricket, and more, today it carries live and on-demand sporting events from Fox Sports, ESPN, and the Australian-based site Racing.com. Kayo Sports also offers original programming, and allows viewers to watch full livestreams of channels like Fox Sports, ESPN, and ESPN2 with the service.
If that sounds familiar, it’s because it’s similar to the plan for the JV service. Disney, Fox, and WBD will combine to send 14 channels to the platform, with complete livestreams of each network to be available. The JV will clearly share a similar structure with Kayo Sports, even if it doesn’t adopt the same name.
If the Kayo brand isn’t intended for the JV sports streamer, why is Fox attempting to trademark it in the U.S.? There could be a host of reasons, one of which is that Fox plans to launch a standalone sports streaming service of its own. In the U.S., Fox owns a big package of Sunday afternoon NFL, college football, and college basketball, MLB, soccer games, and more, but it does not have a way to deliver these sports to streaming customers other than using TV Everywhere credentials acquired from a cable or satellite subscription.
Launching an American Kayo Sports service could change that. Fox's CFO said in September 2023 that the cable bundle was still the most efficient way to deliver sports to audiences, but the company’s involvement in the JV indicates it knows how important reaching cord-cutters and cord-nevers is as well.
Another potential explanation for the trademark application is that the Fox programming inside the joint venture will live under a Kayo banner, alongside the ESPN and Bleacher Report brands from Disney and WBD.
What Will Spulu Actually Be Called?
As of now, it seems unlikely that Fox intends to import a name that few American viewers have prior knowledge of for a product as important as the JV streamer. That leaves room for speculation on just what the platform will be named, since Spulu is also a highly unlikely final candidate.
Streaming services usually go in one of two directions when it comes to a name. Some choose a bland moniker verging on the nondescript, as Max did when it imported content from discovery+ and controversially decided to drop the “HBO” from its former name. Disney has also been known to follow this strategy, as evidenced by Disney+ and ESPN+.
Occasionally, however, streaming executives decide to go much further afield to find a name for their new platforms. Hulu, for example, comes from a Mandarin phrase that means gourd. The streamer’s first CEO Jason Kilar indicated that he chose the name because of the symbolism involved.
“It had this great sort of symbolism of the holder of precious things, which is the holder of premium content,” Kilar told the New York Times in 2020. “So that’s why we named it Hulu.”
There has been speculation that the forthcoming JV could build off of the ubiquity and familiarity of Hulu and go with “Hulu Sports,” but with Disney set to completely own that brand in due course, the other companies might not ultimately be comfortable with that option.
All of this is to say that it’s incredibly difficult to predict a name for the sports JV. It could be something as simple as “ESPN Max” or “Sports+,” or executives in charge could veer in a completely unexpected and esoteric direction to name the platform. Since the service is intended to launch this fall (unless it’s halted by Fubo’s legal challenge), the public likely won’t have to wait much longer to find out.
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