No deal done yet so.
A lot of focus on social media from boxing fandom on Frank Warren’s mutually exclusive deal with BT and how that might prevent (or more likely delay) future integration of BT Sport with a DAZN platform which is heavily reliant on other boxing rights at present.
The Discovery proposal would be a joint venture rather than the outright sale of the channels to DAZN per the FT.
You can sometime read paywalled FT articles if you go in via a search engine - look for "Discovery in talks with BT Sport to hijack sale to DAZN" and click the FT.com result for what's basically a regurgitated version of the Telegraph article.
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You would think OFCOM and the competition commission would want to look at things if Discovery were to buy BT. Although traditionally Eurosport has quietly done it's business in the sports market I think now with Discovery on board there should be competition concerns were they to buy BT Sport in a way there wouldn't be with a newcomer to the market like DAZN.
@Brekkietweets
No problem as far as I can see with competition, Eurosport is headquartered in Paris still, so if as I can see if Discovery buy into BT Sport it'll be done via Eurosport. The issue competition wise would be an aggressive DAZN move and it's impact on the sector.
A Discovery/Eurosport/BT combo seems to me to be the most effective 'solution' to BT wanting to divest some of the Sport service. It also ensures that their service can continue to be sold on BTTV. One of the stumbling blocks with the delayed DAZN deal apparently is DAZN being unwilling to guarantee this in the long term. (widely reported today).
I’m not surprised at that one and I’m not sure why BT would be at this stage of talks - I think the fact that DAZN mainly operate on a direct to consumer model is fairly well known! Of course in the long term they’d want to ditch the linear channels and move to a D2C model, even if they kept the linear channels going for a while or even a few years. Mind you Discovery also seem to be heading down that road too, with Discovery+, even if it’s not yet core to their business as it is for Dazn.
BT Sport being part of Discovery would be a good idea if I'm being honest.
Mateus Honrado post_id=59353 time= user_id=992 Wrote:BT Sport being part of Discovery would be a good idea if I'm being honest.
I just wonder how it would be able to co-exist with Discovery's Eurosport, though...
Everyone's favourite BBC fanatic-of-sorts, making columns blow up since April 2020
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Not sure how it benefits the viewer really. Probably see a huge jump in the price of Discovery Sport too.
@Brekkietweets
