Sports streaming platform FuboTV complains Disney, Fox And Warner Bros. Discovery about their recently announced joint venture, citing what the company calls “extreme suppression of competition in the U.S. sports streaming market,” according to a copy of the lawsuit obtained by CNBC.
The joint venture, announced earlier this month, aims to offer viewers a new way to access top-notch live sports. The launch is planned for this fall, but some questions remain about price and structure.
“These horizontal competitors are collaborating to create a joint venture that will cause significant harm to competition and consumers,” the complaint states.
The Disney channels ESPN and Hulu are also named as defendants in the lawsuit.
“Each of these companies has consistently engaged in anti-competitive practices designed to monopolize the market, stifle all forms of competition, create higher prices for subscribers and deprive consumers of the choice they deserve,” said David Gandler, CEO of FuboTV, in a statement. “We believe that by combining to retain exclusive rights to distribute a dedicated live sports package, these companies are creating insurmountable barriers that will effectively prevent any new competitor from entering the market.”
A spokesman for the joint venture declined to comment.
Rafael Henrique | Light rocket | Getty Images
Fubo argues that Disney, Fox and Warner Bros., which control a significant portion of live sports content in the U.S., have imposed bundling requirements and “significantly above-market licensing fees” on Fubo, driving up prices for consumers.
Their new joint venture now allows the media companies to undercut those prices and avoid the same restrictions on the channels they carry, giving them a competitive advantage, the lawsuit says.
Just last week, the joint venture caused a stir in the traditional pay-TV market when executives at major distributors privately expressed concerns that the new slim package would lead to more cancellations on cable TV, CNBC’s Alex Sherman reported.
Craig Moffett, an analyst at MoffettNathanson, said at the time that antitrust challenges were likely.
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2024-02-20 22:52:08
www.cnbc.com
