AFL bidding rights introduce a new form of bidding... Streaming

[midfielder]

Very interesting article and will affect our new media deal...

http://www.theage.com.au/business/fetch-tv-fights-for-afl-rights-20100318-qik2.html

SOON-TO-LAUNCH pay-TV operator Fetch TV has emerged as a mystery bidder for the television rights for the AFL and is talking to free-to-air TV networks about collaborating with them to shut out Foxtel.

Backed by the Malaysian billionaire T. Ananda Krishnan, who has extensive satellite television interests in Asia through his Astro network, Fetch has put the idea of a joint bid for sporting rights to the commercial networks, sources have confirmed.

Fetch would put up a component of cash in any deal that, if successful, could prevent the pay TV portion from being on sold to Foxtel and Austar, which between them paid the networks $315.5 million over five years to show four games live each week.

Network Ten, which shares the rights with Seven, is the most likely front runner to partner with Fetch in sharing the costs of buying the rights and broadcasting the nine weekly games the AFL will run from the 2012 season.

The AFL, which declined to comment, is expected to ask $1 billion for the next five-year TV deal which runs until 2016.

A Ten spokeswoman said: "They [Fetch] have shown active interest in partnering in the area of sports rights. Should an attractive opportunity arise, we'd be happy to assess it." Fetch declined to comment and all Foxtel spokesman would say was: "We live in interesting times".

Fetch provides subscription TV delivered via a broadcast signal over broadband but not via a satellite or streamed from the internet. The company was the under bidder to Fox Sports in last November's negotiations for the Australian broadcast rights to the English soccer Premier League.

Nine has declared its interest in bidding as has Seven, though a Seven spokesman said no deal of any sort was likely to be struck with Fetch while Nine declined to comment.

The presence of Fetch in the shadows of Ten could scupper any joint bid between Seven and Ten for the next AFL rights.

Fetch will provide pay TV to internet service providers, such as iiNet, Internode and TPG, so they can offer a bundled deal of unmetered pay TV, fixed-line telephone and broadband internet for a monthly fee, allowing them to compete more effectively compete against Telstra, a 50 per cent shareholder in Foxtel and current holder of the online rights.

Fetch's internet service provider partners are expected to charge a quarter of what Foxtel's entry-level service for up to 20 new channels, including BBC and Discovery, beyond all the free-to-air channels subscribers will be able to receive through Fetch's free set-top box.

Fetch's emergence is an indication the world of media convergence has finally landed in Australia. Around the world sports are selling rights to agencies such as IMG and MP & Silva, which then carve them to on sell to broadcasters, pay TV operators or even mobile phone companies, as was the case recently in Singapore when it was left to two telcos to slug it out for the rights to screen the English soccer.

The Indian Premier Cricket League recently signed a two-year deal with YouTube for the video sharing site to screen its matches live, a deal that TV executives say would have been unheard of a year ago, let alone five years ago.

Deloitte's expert on media Damien Tampling said: "It's getting more complex by the day," said . "We have the digital multi channels, then there's the review of the anti- siphoning rules, there's catch up TV over the internet and there's the changing shareholdings in some of the TV landscape as well as the National Broadband Network."

TV executives question whether Fetch can succeed in getting enough ISPs on board number three player iiNet is going public in the next week to ensure the audience is large enough to satisfy the government's anti-siphoning rules and the AFL.

"They certainly have deep pockets. That's for sure but the question remains - will they be able to get enough subscribers to get the audience that they need," questioned one TV executive.

 

[Jimmy]

Very interesting.
There is meant to be a release of broadband enabled tv tuners coming out in Australia. This opens a whole new can of worms to the FTA debate.

 

[FFC Mariner]

Will be the future as internet TV takes out pay tv (and FTA).

Telstra are being forced into the disaster known as the NBN and the lever is the spectrum they want to buy to run this sort of stuff (and next gen mobiles)

Not my field but if you are a FTA shareholder, I'd be getting out about....................NOW.

Sadly, it will be held back here by the Govts f**ked NBN strategy