The name and branding of the upcoming joint venture sports streaming service formed by US media giants Disney, Fox Corp, and Warner Bros. Discovery (WBD) has been revealed.
Venu Sports, pronounced venue, will be the name of the service, which will combine the sports streaming property portfolios of the three major broadcasters and control over 50% of live sports broadcasts in the US both regionally and nationally.
In a statement, Venu Sports chief executive Pete Distad said: “We are excited to officially introduce Venu Sports, a brand that we feel captures the spirit of an all-new streaming home where sports fans outside of the traditional pay TV eco-system can experience an incredible collection of live sports, all in one place.”
The service is eyeing a launch in the latter half of 2024 in a wholly new app that will come with the potential to bundle it with the Disney+ service, Fox’s Hulu, or WBD’s Max streaming services.
Distad added: “As preparations for the platform continue to accelerate, we are singularly focused on delivering a best-in-class product for our target audience, built from the ground up using the latest technologies to engage and entertain discerning sports fans wanting one-stop access to live games.”
Despite not launching yet, Venu Sports is not without its controversies, with rival sports streamer FuboTV earlier this month leading a coalition of broadcasters, network carriers, and public interest groups in signing a letter to Congress demanding hearings about the venture.
The letter called on members of Congress from the Senate Commerce Committee, Senate Judiciary Committee, House Energy and Commerce Committee, and the House Judiciary Committee, to hold hearings about pay-TV competitiveness.
It states: “In addition to controlling 80% of all national live sports broadcasts, the [joint venture] will control approximately 55% of all live sports (regional and national). We cannot think of any scenario in the history of the United States where consumer interests have been served when such an important industry – here, access to live sports – is effectively controlled by three programming giants which decided to combine forces instead of competing against each other.
“Worse yet, these same programming giants enforce anti-competitive and inflationary contract restrictions on distributors that will insulate the JV’s streaming service from head-to-head competition because these contract restrictions prohibit competing distributors from offering consumers their own “skinny,” live sports bundle.
“The JV will eventually dominate the distribution market for live sports and will drive out competition, leaving consumers captive to the JV for live sports – unless Congress and regulators intervene.”
