Apple 'Ready to Spend Billions' on Live Sports Content Over Next Four Years

[sideshowuniqueuser]

I'll believe it when I see it. There has been great opportunities for Apple to spend a little of the hoard to buy the accumulated libraries of whole studios (WB, 20th Century Fox, etc) in the recent past. Rumors flew that they might. Then others actually acquired them (AT&T, Disney) and the stories say Apple didn't even bid.

That NFL Thursday Night Football deal was up for bidders and Apple could have bid. Did they? At all? And Amazon ended up with that one.

The MGM Film Studio was just up for sale. Did Apple bid for that one? No? Amazon acquired that library too, for less than 3X the Beats deal Apple did do.

The Universal Studios acquisition wasn't really that long ago, but not as recent as these others. Did Apple bid against Comcast for that one?

There's ongoing rumors that Sony/Columbia Pictures could be acquired. Is Apple interested? Are they trying at all for it?

NFL Sunday Ticket was previously up for bids in 2014. Various players showed legit interest. Was Apple in that bidding at all? AT&T apparently renewed it then for about $1.5B/yr so not exactly break Apple-type money. Did they bid?

Imagine AppleTV with the WB library, 20th Century Fox library (perhaps getting to keep regional Fox Sports channels/deals too?), MGM, Columbia, Universal and/or NFL Thursday Night football and (what was) Fox regional sports channels, etc. Most of the opportunities could have been purchased for small-to-middling chunks of the cash hoard and/or cheap debt. Was Apple at least in the bidding? What's different this time?

Apple didn't buy those studios because Timmy wants to create a culture of content, which he has done. But has failed to get many people watching it. Now he wants sports, so he can alter the culture of sports with his own culture, and indoctrinate the masses.

 

[TheOldChevy]

You mean the US? Thats hardly important. Apple is not making there money in the US. And why not buying global rights? It´s a small world so why not buy one of the big sports? Completely? Like Soccer would be about 20 Billion. It is the dominant sport on the planet. By far. Followed by Cricket, WAY cheaper then soccer, global rights would be closer to 6 Billion.
Number 3 is more expensive because lots happens in the US and the wages are obsene, so are the rights.
Everything down the list gets cheaper then a billion per year except Number 9, few followers but ridiculous prices, localized and doing there own thing.

• 1. Soccer / Association Football – 3.5 Billion Followers
• 2. Cricket – 2.5 Billion Followers
• 3. Basketball – 2.2 Billion Followers
• 4. Hockey – 2 Billion Followers
• 5. Tennis – 1 Billion Followers
• 6. Volleyball – 900 Million Followers
• 7. Table Tennis – 850 Million Followers
• 8. Baseball – 500 Million Followers
• 9. Rugby – 410 Million Followers
• 9. American Football – 410 Million Followers
• 10. Golf – 390 M

That's an interesting list.

Do you have growth indications ? I would imagine that Apple will focus on growth markets.

 

[GuilleA]

Ah yes, very familiar with the “I don’t want it therefore it’s stupid” argument. I saw it a lot in 4th grade. Fortunately for this American company American sports are a lucrative market. Your suggestion that Apple must choose between sports programming and further Apple Maps development is also noted.

Well, it's not just me. Practically every human being outside the US doesn't give a **** about the NFL, NHL and MLB. They barely (next to nothing) care about the NBA, and that's it. Apple services are too focused for the US market, and they always neglect international customers.

 

[Kabeyun]

Well, it's not just me. Practically every human being outside the US doesn't give a **** about the NFL, NHL and MLB. They barely (next to nothing) care about the NBA, and that's it. Apple services are too focused for the US market, and they always neglect international customers.

Like I said, you’re aware that Apple, Inc. is an American company, right? Nonetheless, your hyperbole amuses me, particularly in light of this post here on the very same day as the current one. So much for “always.”

Besides “always” in an internet forum post, another easy way to spot someone who doesn’t actually know the data is to look for the phrase “practically every.”

Aside from all that, I invite you to read the first paragraph in this article. It’s only two sentences.

 

[BuffaloTF]

No idea why this phrase is still ignorantly brought up. A football is called a football because the ball is a foot long. Soccer wasn't even a term invented by the Americans, the British coined the term soccer as an abbreviation from its original name "Association Football". American football was called Gridiron Football and later changed to American football after adopting its own rules.

The only reason the British called soccer "football" is to match the other European languages that call it Futbol etc.

They’re 11 inches… and that’s not why it’s called football.

Football is the name of the source sport, centuries old. It wasn’t codified, and resembled a mix of rugby and soccer - Gaelic football if you’d like something closest to what it was. As it started being codified, it split based on codes adopted. Football became Rugby Football, Association Football. American Football, Canadian Football, and -because of the popularity of cricket in Australia and the availability of oval fields - Australian Football. Soccer is a nickname, like rugger, and how it was named as an export from England. The name football was used throughout, and soccer as a term was posh. As the US landed all the big stars in the NASL, they started adopting football to not be American… and because it was the working man’s term for it anyway. The e name soccer is still present in England in the Soccer Aid program, and I think iTV only recently stopped calling their coverage of the sport ‘soccer’.

 

[BuffaloTF]

Well, it's not just me. Practically every human being outside the US doesn't give a **** about the NFL, NHL and MLB. They barely (next to nothing) care about the NBA, and that's it. Apple services are too focused for the US market, and they always neglect international customers.

And you’d be woefully incorrect in your anecdotal statement. The NHL is huge in every hockey playing country on the planet. The NBA is huge in China. The MLB is popular through the entirety of the America’s. Not to mention… each of these leagues has teams outside of the US - so you’d be wrong without even geographically leaving where they play in that asinine statement.

 

[BuffaloTF]

That list kinda makes sense, but drop nascar. We need hockey, not hillbillies.

I will happily pony up a couple extra bucks to be able to watch the Penguins without having to switch to AT&... DirecTV.

NHL Center Ice was available on every cable company and streaming. It’s now part of ESPN+.

 

[BuffaloTF]

really? Superbowl had 100 million viewers,not all watch the whole game, some only the half time show but still, a massive amount of viewers. An average NFL game get less the 20 million viewers.

Table tennis champion game was watched bei 220 million viewers.
Just saying.
A country like India with 4 times the population of the US that puts cricket close to god status, btw Australia, Pakistan, the UK and others do the same, outstrips the NFL several times. It is very very localised, only in the US (all attempts to bring it outside have failed) and the US is tiny in comparison.

…in the US. Worldwide it has over 800 million viewers. Only the World Cup final, and the Twenty20 World Cup tops it.

 

[sjsharksfan12]

I'm interested in this Baseball news they have going. I think they should do what ESPN did with Hockey and just get the entire MLB.TV package. Apple could probably do a better job with it than MLB has.

 

[cupcakes2000]

…in the US. Worldwide it has over 800 million viewers. Only the World Cup final, and the Twenty20 World Cup tops it.

You’ll probably have to back that up because I don’t think that’s even close to accurate.

A cursory glance shows this website thinks the 2020 Super Bowl drew just short of 100m in the US, and 30-50m worldwide.

Infographic: Super Bowl Pales in Comparison to the Biggest Game in Soccer

This chart compares the average global TV viewership of FIFA World Cup Finals compared to the estimated global TV audience of the Super Bowl.

www.statista.com

According to FIFA, the 2018 World Cup final between France and Croatia reached an average live audience of 517 million viewers, with more than than 1.1 billion people tuning in over its 90 minutes. The 2020 Super Bowl pales in comparison, having had an average viewership of 99.9 million in the U.S. plus an estimated 30 to 50 million viewers around the world.

 

[MareLuce]

If this means stripping out all of the incessant advertising during and between games,.

100% agree. I feel my brain cells decaying when subjected to commercials during NFL football games, the only thing I really really want to watch live.

Over the holidays I gave $1 bills to the youngest kids visiting if they successfully muted the commercials within 1-2 sec of them starting. Actually, $1 per commercial + a $2 bonus for 5 in a row. Yes, I dug out my $2 bill stash of travel tip $ to make it special.

Of course this led to debates over how I was measuring the time and fights to be the one holding the remote, but actually that was kind of fun and educational for them. I asked them to determine what was fair.

However, now my cousin reports his kids expect the same from him. Ha!

 

[BuffaloTF]

You’ll probably have to back that up because I don’t think that’s even close to accurate.

A cursory glance shows this website thinks the 2020 Super Bowl drew just short of 100m in the US, and 30-50m worldwide.

Infographic: Super Bowl Pales in Comparison to the Biggest Game in Soccer

This chart compares the average global TV viewership of FIFA World Cup Finals compared to the estimated global TV audience of the Super Bowl.

www.statista.com

You’re looking at, here, the number of television sets. The number of humans watching both the Super Bowl and World Cup are far higher. The World Cup final is estimated between 2 and 3 billion, for example. They’re both group activities.

And the Nielsen tv ratings for the Super Bowl are falling as streaming takes hold and replaces it.

 

[Bandaman]

But is it ready to spend billions on Siri and Apple Maps for the rest of the world? I don't give a **** about American football.

Or just spending billions on Siri and to fix their awful predictive auto correct.

 

[coolfactor]

Boring. The Sports industry is already mature and involves million-dollar salaries. What about the little guy, Apple?

 

[Chlloret]

…in the US. Worldwide it has over 800 million viewers. Only the World Cup final, and the Twenty20 World Cup tops it.

Sorry, no. Last Superbowl had an estimated viewing of combined network and streaming of 101million viewers in the US and 155million Worldwide (including the US)
Thats the 24h number, so live and catch up. Weekly numbers are bigger but they do not count for a live event.
There simply is no interest in an exclusively American sport interrupted every 10 Minutes by 10 minutes advertizing. A game with 4 quarters that lasts nearly 4hours is in a world where soccer dominates, I mean DOMINATES, not feasible. When we say 90mins, then it means 90mins, there are other things to do then watching tv. Cricked is bad enough, games can last days, but normally any sport, especially when televised, has a time frame around 2h max. Remember, outside the US we do not know about permanent interruptions for commercials. If you pay for a channel, it is in some countries even illegal to show ad breaks, you already payed for the channel. Also, how do you want to interrupt a soccer match? Those guys are athletes, more so the rugby players, they do not run around in huge protective uniforms so they do not get hurt, they are on the field and running for miles, non stop, not a few yards at a time to the next time out to have a break.

 

[cupcakes2000]

You’re looking at, here, the number of television sets. The number of humans watching both the Super Bowl and World Cup are far higher. The World Cup final is estimated between 2 and 3 billion, for example. They’re both group activities.

And the Nielsen tv ratings for the Super Bowl are falling as streaming takes hold and replaces it.

As we are taking estimates of figures from the same source, then it makes no real difference, as all the figures for all of the sports will in all likelihood increase by the same amount. Meaning that the general popularity of the super bowl remains the same in relation to the others.

But nontheless - this still doesn’t tell me where you plucked the 800 million world wide viewers figure from, which was what I asked.

 

[robd003]

I really hope the sports package is an optional extra. I have no desire to waste money on things I'll never watch.

 

[SFjohn]

Sounds like the price of Apple TV+ will be going up quite a bit in the future if they do this. 🙁

 

[BuffaloTF]

Sorry, no. Last Superbowl had an estimated viewing of combined network and streaming of 101million viewers in the US and 155million Worldwide (including the US)
Thats the 24h number, so live and catch up. Weekly numbers are bigger but they do not count for a live event.
There simply is no interest in an exclusively American sport interrupted every 10 Minutes by 10 minutes advertizing. A game with 4 quarters that lasts nearly 4hours is in a world where soccer dominates, I mean DOMINATES, not feasible. When we say 90mins, then it means 90mins, there are other things to do then watching tv. Cricked is bad enough, games can last days, but normally any sport, especially when televised, has a time frame around 2h max. Remember, outside the US we do not know about permanent interruptions for commercials. If you pay for a channel, it is in some countries even illegal to show ad breaks, you already payed for the channel. Also, how do you want to interrupt a soccer match? Those guys are athletes, more so the rugby players, they do not run around in huge protective uniforms so they do not get hurt, they are on the field and running for miles, non stop, not a few yards at a time to the next time out to have a break.

Sorry, yes. You’re quoting ratings. The World Cup final in 2018 had 517 million. Yet the estimation for total viewers is over 2 billion. Why? Because more than 1 person is able to watch a television at a single time. In other words, quit giving Nielsen ratings - they’re useless.

 

[ErikGrim]

So why are you here?

In North America, the NFL is a massive entity, and even for worldwide audiences. Apple has potential to make a lot of money alone just with broadcasting the NFL, one of the most popular sports ever with Football.

Literally no one outside of the US cares about the NFL.

 

[H3LL5P4WN]

NHL Center Ice was available on every cable company and streaming. It’s now part of ESPN+.

While true, that doesn’t get around the fact that AT&T Sports Net blacks out my games locally.

 

[webkit]

Literally no one outside of the US cares about the NFL.

That is literally untrue. I'm not sure what the numbers are today but below is a chart from 2015. If more or less still accurate, over 40% of NFL "fans" are outside of the U.S.

 

[cupcakes2000]

That is literally untrue. I'm not sure what the numbers are today but below is a chart from 2015. If more or less still accurate, over 40% of NFL "fans" are outside of the U.S.

View attachment 1945614

I get your point, but this graphic doesn’t really prove it. More the opposite. Look at a similar graphic about other top sports; Footy, Tennis, Basket Ball, Golf, etc… even Cricket which is also confined mainly to select countries - you’ll see why the rest of the world view American football as only really an American centric sport, unlike almost all other sports. Except baseball. Which has the same issue.

 

[webkit]

I get your point, but this graphic doesn’t really prove it. More the opposite. Look at a similar graphic about other top sports; Footy, Tennis, Basket Ball, Golf, etc… even Cricket which is also confined mainly to select countries - you’ll see why the rest of the world view American football as only really an American centric sport, unlike almost all other sports. Except baseball. Which has the same issue.

My point was in response to the "Literally no one outside of the US cares about the NFL" comment. It was not about how popular it may be compared to other sports like footy/soccer, tennis, etc. but that a notable number (over 80 million) and portion (over 40%) of NFL fans are outside of the U.S. That's far from "literally no one."

Plus, the graphic I posted didn't even include China where the popularity of NFL football has apparently been growing significantly. Given that, there could very well be even more NFL fans OUTSIDE the U.S. than there are in the U.S. today. All of this would/could make it a desirable addition to a global streaming service, if the price/deal is right.

 

[BuffaloTF]

While true, that doesn’t get around the fact that AT&T Sports Net blacks out my games locally.

That’s true of every RSN and every sports package. It’s a hurdle that needs to be overcome just like the local no-sellout blackout rule the NFL used to have.