Spark waves yellow flag at Sky
Spark has won the New Zealand rights to Formula One races, which it will stream online.
Spark head of sport Jeff Latch said the broadband and phone company had secured rights to the Formula One and Formula Two championships, GP3 Series and the 2019 Porsche Super Cup Series, for three years, starting with the Australian Grand Prix in March.
Spark threw down the gauntlet to Sky Television in April when it announced it had won the rights to next year’s Rugby World Cup in Tokyo. It followed that in August by winning the rights to English Premier League matches for three seasons from next August.
Managing director Simon Moutter said then that Spark intended to be ‘‘a key player in the evolving sports media landscape’’.
‘‘We are setting out to transform the way sport is distributed and viewed in New Zealand, in the same way general entertainment viewing has been transformed by the likes of Lightbox, Netflix and YouTube.’’
Latch said Spark would announce it had won more sports content rights within weeks, and would launch a new sports streaming service to deliver the programming ‘‘early next year’’.
Pricing has yet to be disclosed. But spokeswoman Ellie Cross indicated Spark might have enough content for it to offer all its sports for a single price, making it a direct competitor to Sky Sport.
Customers will not have to be Spark broadband customers to watch its sports service. ‘‘This is absolutely for all Kiwis,’’ she said.
The motorsports rights are likely to have cost Spark millions of dollars.
Formula One media rights manager Michaella Snoeck said Spark would provide New Zealanders with ‘‘unprecedented coverage in the territory’’.