Wait, but won’t this hurt Fox News and other linear programming?
Though linear TV has been in steady decline, Fox News still boasts the highest ratings among the cablers. So could this new deal hurt cable bundles and ultimately pull even more viewers away from linear?
Murdoch doesn’t think so.
“Particularly for Fox News, I think the risks are very low,” Murdoch said. “And that’s because of the focus of the sports product being on the cord nevers. Fox News continues to be the top-rated cable network, and our distributors, our partners, really value that channel and that brand as it really drives tremendous viewership and audience engagement for them.”
According to Murdoch, Fox News will continue to drive that viewership unscathed in the traditional cable and pay TV bundles.
“We are confident that this product will be additive and will give us incremental subscribers and not affect significantly the traditional bundle,” Murdoch said.
What will this new combined streamer look like?
Murdoch didn’t get into details about the look of the streamer but said he had seen prototypes.
According to the Fox CEO, the new combined product will be “unique” and “very innovative” when it launches. However, further details remain under wraps.
Since this is a combined product, does this change how Fox goes after sports rights?
With sports enjoying growing ratings even amid a linear decline, the market is getting increasingly competitive outside of traditional broadcasters. For instance, Netflix recently inked a multi-billion dollar deal with WWE for rights, making a big move in the live-viewing space.
Even with the streamer being a combined product, Murdoch said the company’s approach to rights is unchanged.
“We will be aggressively competing in the sports market for sports rights. Nothing has changed there,” Murdoch said. “The primary business and value in Fox Sports is competing in for every subscriber in the traditional cable pay TV bundle, viewer and ultimately advertiser.”
Could more partners join?
Some industry experts were surprised other major broadcast owners, such as Paramount and NBCUniversal, weren’t in the initial announcements. And it doesn’t seem like they’ll join anytime soon.
“That’s not something that we’re considering at this stage,” Murdoch said about adding partners. “We think that the 14 linear networks that this service gives people a tremendous amount of content.”
