Judge blocks Venu Sports launch

There have been a lot of people excited about the fall launch of Venu Sports, the over-the-top streaming product expected to combine sports offerings from ESPN/Disney, TNT Sports/WBD, and Fox Sports. But that excitement may have to be dialed down for a while, with federal judge Margaret Garnett (of the Southern District of New York) issuing a preliminary injunction in favor of Fubo’s lawsuit against Venu Sports Friday:

This is only the latest development in the long-running Fubo lawsuit (and other public comments ) against Venu. But an interesting dimension of that is the participation (or lack thereof) from other multichannel video programming distributors. Fubo’s arguments in this case are theoretically applicable to any other MVPD looking to offer a cable/satellite/virtual MVPD bundle, but the public weigh-in on their side has been limited. But, after this verdict Friday, DirecTV fully endorsed the Fubo case, as per a statement from spokesperson Jon Greer sent to Awful Announcing:

“We are pleased with the court decision and believe that it appropriately recognizes the potential harms of allowing major programmers to license their content to an affiliated distributor on more favorable terms than they license their content to third parties.”

It’s notable as well that Fubo has previously invoked other supporters. That was seen in a letter they sent to the Senate Commerce Committee in May (which prompted some significant politician responses ), where they included DirecTV, Dish, and Newsmax as signatories:

The JV between Disney, Fox, and Warner is expected to launch this fall, in time for the next NFL and college football seasons. In addition to controlling 80% of all national live sports broadcasts, the JV will control approximately 55% of all live sports (regional and national).2 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.

Meanwhile, ESPN has stated that they will appeal the injunction:

The full text there is “We respectfully disagree with the court’s ruling and are appealing it. We believe that Fubo’s arguments are wrong on the facts and the law, and that Fubo has failed to prove it is legally entitled to a preliminary injunction. Venu Sports is a pro-competitive option that aims to enhance consumer choice by reaching a segment of consumers who are currently not served by existing subscription options.”

The Venu Sports fight can be seen from many different angles. But one of the most notable is the debate over how comprehensive it is. Many critics, including the NFL’s Brian Rolapp , have tried to claim Venu has a worse offering versus what’s out there. But those critics (also including CBS executives ) have missed that Venu’s initial price point means that it plus CBS and NBC over-the-top options (before any talk of antennas, making those networks’ offerings even cheaper) will cost less than the full MVPD options offered by the likes of Fubo. Fubo can argue that the other non-sports, non-broadcast channels it has make it (and, presumably, other MVPDs) a better option overall, but it can’t compete with the Venu pricing for people just looking for ESPN, TBS, TNT, and FS1.

We’re a long ways from any final ruling on Venu. And this preliminary injunction does not mean that the service will not launch this fall, or will not launch at all. That will depend on how the appeal plays out. But this is a notable current win for Fubo and those who have joined them in propping up the current MVPD distribution model versus making sports cable networks’ offerings available in an over-the-top bundle. And we’ll see where that goes from here.

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