Sports streaming service Fubo has temporarily stifled a major financial threat from Venu Sports, a potential Disney-Fox-Warner competitor, and its sports broadcasting license collection, thanks to a recent court ruling. A federal judge in the Southern District of New York granted Fubo’s motion for a preliminary injunction in its antitrust lawsuit against its joint sports streaming venture and its parent company.
U.S. District Judge Margaret Garnett wrote in an opinion issued earlier today that such a concentrated collection of media power would eliminate consumer choice. Venu’s launch would also “raise prices for both consumers and other distributors” and create “years of exclusivity runway” in sports streaming for Disney, Fox and Warner.
“Even though it [joint venture] Defendants swear that such price increases and exclusion of competition will not actually occur (though … there is good reason to believe that they will).” “One purpose of an antitrust injunction is to prevent anticompetitive incentives from being created in the first place, so that American consumers do not have to take their word for it and hope for the best,” the brief states.
Garnett also wrote that the injunction was necessary because of the “substantial harm that cannot be adequately repaired by money” if Fox-Disney-Warner’s Benu Sports venture continues.
Fox-Disney-Warner first announced plans to launch a live sports streaming channel in February, later revealing the name and price of the Venu Sports streaming service. According to a press release, the joint sports streaming venture will cost viewers $42.99 per month with a seven-day free trial and promise access to 14 live sporting events on ESPN+ and its four spin-off channels, the Fox network and two Fox Sports channels, and a handful of Warner Bros.-owned cable networks like TNT and TruTV.
Fubo filed the lawsuit just weeks after the initial Fox-Disney-Warner announcement. Fubo’s antitrust suit accuses the three media giants of a “year-long campaign” to undermine the sports streaming service. The suit also claims the joint venture would concentrate too many entities in one service, stifle competition, and drive up prices for viewers and distributors.
The injunction temporarily puts on hold Fox-Disney-Warner’s plans for Venu Sports, whose fate will ultimately be decided by an antitrust lawsuit in federal court.
