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Hakim AS secara sementara menghentikan perusahaan media Disney, Warner Bros. Discovery, dan Fox dari meluncurkan layanan streaming olahraga mereka, Venu, menurut dokumen pengadilan.
Injungsi sementara, yang diberikan sebagai respons atas gugatan yang diajukan oleh Fubo TV, datang hanya beberapa minggu sebelum dimulainya musim National Football League. Perusahaan-perusahaan tersebut telah berencana untuk meluncurkan layanan mereka pada tanggal tersebut.
Fubo, bundel TV internet mirip dengan paket TV berlangganan tradisional, mengklaim dalam gugatannya bahwa Venu bersifat anti-kompetitif dan akan mengganggu bisnisnya. Saham Fubo naik 16% pada Jumat setelah berita tentang injungsi tersebut.
\”Putusan hari ini adalah kemenangan bukan hanya untuk Fubo tetapi juga untuk konsumen. Keputusan ini akan membantu memastikan bahwa konsumen memiliki akses ke pasar yang lebih kompetitif dengan berbagai pilihan streaming olahraga,\” kata CEO Fubo David Gandler dalam rilis pers setelah keputusan pengadilan.
Warner Bros. Discovery, Fox, dan ESPN Disney mengumumkan pembentukan layanan streaming patungan tersebut pada Februari. Tak lama setelah itu, Fubo mengajukan gugatan antitrust terhadap ventura tersebut.
Pada Jumat, Fubo mengatakan akan melanjutkan gugatan antitrustnya terhadap perusahaan-perusahaan itu atas praktik anti-kompetitif mereka. Dalam beberapa bulan terakhir, para legislator, termasuk Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass.; Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt.; dan Rep. Joaquin Castro, D-Texas, mengirimkan surat mendorong untuk menyelidiki Venu.
\”Kami tidak setuju dengan putusan pengadilan dan sedang mengajukan banding,\” kata Warner Bros. Discovery, Fox, dan ESPN Disney dalam pernyataan bersama pada Jumat.
\”Kami percaya bahwa argumen Fubo salah berdasarkan fakta dan hukum, dan bahwa Fubo gagal membuktikan bahwa mereka berhak secara hukum atas injungsi sementara. Venu Sports adalah pilihan yang pro-kompetitif yang bertujuan untuk meningkatkan pilihan konsumen dengan mencapai segmen pemirsa yang saat ini tidak dilayani oleh pilihan langganan yang ada.\”
Earlier this month, Venu announced pricing of $42.99 per month.
The service would offer the complete suite of live sports rights owned by the parent companies, which includes the National Basketball Association, National Hockey League, Major League Baseball, college football and basketball, among others. Venu subscribers would also have access to 14 traditional TV sports networks of its parent companies, including ESPN, ABC, Fox, TNT and TBS, as well as the streaming service ESPN+.
The expensive price point is common when it comes to streaming live sports so it doesn’t shake up any carriage agreements with traditional pay TV distributors.
In court documents, U.S. Judge Margaret Garnett noted that the three companies control about 54% of all U.S. sports rights, and at least 60% of all nationally broadcast U.S. sports rights.
\”There is significant evidence in the record that the true figures may be even larger,\” Garnett said in court papers.
\”This means that alone, Disney, Fox, and [Warner Bros. Discovery] are each significant players in live sports licensing, who otherwise compete against each other both to secure sports telecast rights and to attract viewers to their live sports programming. But together, they are dominant,\” Garnett said in her decision.
Outside of these companies, Paramount Global’s CBS and Comcast’s NBC are the other largest holders of U.S. sports rights. Streaming services, such as Amazon’s Prime Video, have also begun offering live sports exclusively.
Traditional pay TV distributors have been losing customers at a fast clip as they opt for streaming services and out of the notoriously expensive bundle. Meanwhile, companies such as Fubo — a streaming option of the bundle — have seen their prices rise due to the high programming costs related to the networks they carry.
An advertisement for Venu Sports, the sports streaming venture by Disney, Warner Bros. Discovery and Fox, hangs at the Fanatics Fest event in New York City on Aug. 16, 2024.
Jessica Golden | CNBC
The marketing around Venu so far had been that it would target sports fans outside of the traditional pay TV bundle.
But Fubo’s lawsuit alleged that the sports streaming service violates antitrust law, and is the latest example of anticompetitive behavior from the three media companies.
A multiday hearing took place in the last week, in which representatives for Fubo, as well as satellite TV bundle providers DirecTV and EchoStar’s Dish — which also offer competing internet TV bundles and supported Fubo in the suit — argued the streaming bundle would be detrimental to their businesses.
During the hearing, an attorney for Warner Bros. Discovery told the judge an injunction would \”terminate\” Venu, Front Office Sports reported.
\”This ruling is a major victory for consumers and competition in the video marketplace,\” Jeff Blum, executive vice president of external and government affairs at EchoStar, said in a statement.
\”We are pleased with the court decision and believe that it appropriately recognizes the potential harms of allowing major programmers to license their content to an affiliated distributor on more favorable terms than they license their content to third parties,\” DirecTV said in a statement Friday.
Disclosure: Comcast owns NBCUniversal, the parent company of CNBC.
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