Amazon may bid for English soccer rights
Amazon’s sports broadcasting ambitions will be tested this week in a multibillion-pound auction of English Premier League soccer rights, potentially pitting it against Sky and BT.
Amazon’s sports broadcasting ambitions will be tested this week in a multibillion-pound auction of English Premier League soccer rights, potentially pitting it against Sky and BT.
England’s auction for the rights to screen matches including Manchester United and City, Liverpool and Chelsea is one of the biggest money spinners in world sport, raising £5.14bn at home in the past three years.
Broadcasters that have stumped up for the best packages to win viewers and fend off rivals could now face another threat from one of the big US tech groups entering the fray.
Amazon, the world’s largest retailer, has moved aggressively into TV to bolster its Amazon Prime membership service, which offers free delivery and content for a flat monthly fee, and the new auction appears to have been structured specifically to attract a digital player for at least a small set of games.
That is likely to force Rupert Murdoch’s Sky and Britain’s biggest telecoms group, BT, to increase their offers. Financial and strategic pressures mean analysts do not think they will match previous 70% jumps.
There was a “very real threat that Amazon will look to take at least some of the UK and, later on, international rights”, Guy Bisson from the media analyst firm Ampere said ahead of the auction, which begins on Friday. Amazon has won the rights to some of the US’s National Football League and ATP tennis.
Sky refused to discuss its commercial strategy, while Amazon declined to comment.
The English auction for the three seasons beginning 201920 will make 200 live games available out of the 380 played each season, divided into seven lots, with five packages consisting of 32 games and two packages of 20 games.
One package will include the rights to show a whole round of matches at the same time, an option that could be more attractive to a digital provider than a traditional broadcaster.
In the previous auction Sky, which built its business on the back of the Premier League, picked up 126 games to BT’s 42. Analysts expect they will want to achieve at least a similar outcome this time around.
But both are to some extent limited. Sky, present in 13-million homes, had to cut costs, hike prices and drop other sports to afford the last round of rights.
It also has an uncertain future as it is not clear who will own Sky when the 2019 season begins, with Murdoch’s 21st Century Fox trying to buy the 61% it does not own.
Sky could be sold to Disney if a separate sale of Murdoch’s TV and film assets receives the green light.