Apple Reportedly Planning Bid for English Premier League Streaming Rights

[MacRumors]

Apple is preparing a bid for the rights to stream the English Premier League in the United Kingdom, reports The Daily Mail.

Without citing its sources, the British tabloid claims that the tech giant is keen to increase its sports coverage by building on the decade-long contract it recently secured to exclusively stream Major League Soccer on Apple TV+ beginning next month.

If the report is accurate, Apple would become the fourth major player in contention to purchase domestic broadcasting rights for top-flight soccer (or football, as it's more commonly called in the UK).

That would likely see a marked increase in the current £5.1 billion ($6.23 billion) valuation for domestic EPL rights, which operates on a three-year renewal cycle. Tender rights are to be renewed later this year, with existing rights for the current three-year period set to expire in 2025.

Recent years have seen bidding wars play out between Sky Sports, BT Sport, and Amazon Prime Video, with Sky Sports often being the dominant player. However, packaging terms ensure that no one broadcaster gains rights to all English Premier League matches, therefore any Apple deal for EPL broadcasting rights would necessarily fall short of the exclusivity deal the company successfully negotiated with MLS.

In related news, Apple TV+ on Sunday premiered "Super League: The War for Football," a docuseries charting the ill-fated proposal for a breakaway European league pitting the sport's elite clubs against each other.

Article Link: Apple Reportedly Planning Bid for English Premier League Streaming Rights

 

[NightFox]

...(or football, as it's more commonly called in the UK rest of the World).

Fixed that for you

 

[Seanm87]

It's really annoying having to pay for 3 separate channels to watch the sport you love, and even then it isn't even every match. Now we could potentially have 4.

I would love there to just be one with all the rights, don't care if that's Apple Sky etc. But I guess the premier league being as greedy as they are will not allow it.

 

[The Phazer]

It's really annoying having to pay for 3 separate channels to watch the sport you love, and even then it isn't even every match. Now we could potentially have 4.

I would love there to just be one with all the rights, don't care if that's Apple Sky etc. But I guess the premier league being as greedy as they are will not allow it.

Under competition regulation no single entity is allowed to buy all the packages, irrespective of what the Premier League would want.

The League would probably prefer the highest bidder to win all six packages and if that's a single service then so much the better, but they're not allowed to do that under Ofcom regulation, and it is probably best for the market that that's the case.

 

[Hermes Monster]

Pretty sure this originated in the Daily Mail so it can be disregarded

 

[Treble]

It's really annoying having to pay for 3 separate channels to watch the sport you love, and even then it isn't even every match. Now we could potentially have 4.

I would love there to just be one with all the rights, don't care if that's Apple Sky etc. But I guess the premier league being as greedy as they are will not allow it.

4 letters IPTV 😉

 

[Hermes Monster]

Under competition regulation no single entity is allowed to buy all the packages, irrespective of what the Premier League would want.

The League would probably prefer the highest bidder to win all six packages and if that's a single service then so much the better, but they're not allowed to do that under Ofcom regulation, and it is probably best for the market that that's the case.

Isn’t competition law supposed to benefit the consumer? I’m not sure how having to pay for four services is beneficial - and we still can’t watch all games!

 

[jtxiii]

"packaging terms ensure that no one broadcaster gains rights to all English Premier League matches"
This is only valid in the UK. In the rest of the world, rights are sold per country to individual bidders. You could definitely see Apple scoop a 'rest of world' package. The premier League has big international appeal.

 

[MacBH928]

It's really annoying having to pay for 3 separate channels to watch the sport you love, and even then it isn't even every match. Now we could potentially have 4.

I would love there to just be one with all the rights, don't care if that's Apple Sky etc. But I guess the premier league being as greedy as they are will not allow it.

My forever motto, if you do not like something, boycott it!

 

[NightFox]

My forever motto, if you do not like something, boycott it!

I don't think it's always that simple though. For example, here OP loves watching football, but doesn't like the way broadcast rights are managed. So how does he boycott that? Stop watching football? It seems like he'd lose out big time there whilst the 'boycotted' wouldn't even notice.

 

[Ctrlos]

I have one channel in the UK that provides all major sporting events and doesn't cost you any subscription money beyond refreshments: The Pub.

 

[Oberhorst]

...soccer (or football, as it's more commonly called in the UK).

"More commonly"? It's only called football here and never soccer.

 

[return2sendai]

“Soccer” originated from “Assoc.”, the abbreviation for “Association”, and was introduced by the FA (Football Association) in order to differentiate football, aka soccer, from rugby football, aka rugby, until rugby reduced the use of the term rugby “football” and we Brits reverted to calling soccer football again.

 

[testcard]

As long as the players benefit that's all that matters - they're so terribly underpaid.

 

[The Phazer]

Isn’t competition law supposed to benefit the consumer? I’m not sure how having to pay for four services is beneficial - and we still can’t watch all games!

Competition is beneficial to the consumer - a single provider wouldn't be any cheaper than the individual subs, what incentive would they have to do that? Sky charged significantly more per game in real terms than currently the case when they had total exclusivity.

You literally can't watch everything, so having access to everything is not really a good thing.

 

[Apple Knowledge Navigator]

This would be a game-changer; however I don’t see Apple continuing to charge their current price. Their previous deal fell through because they wouldn’t budge, so it makes me wonder if it’s sustainable.

 

[laptech]

Apple would probably go for 'rest of the world' rights to get exclusivity because UK competition law would prevent them from getting all the rights within the UK. The English Premiership has proven to be extremely popular abroad and what a perfect way that would be for Apple to get it's Apple TV into every country in the world.

 

[SactoGuy18]

It will be VERY interesting to see if Apple's proposed deal breaks the long-held ban on 3:00 pm British time live TV broadcasts of matches.

 

[SactoGuy18]

Apple would probably go for 'rest of the world' rights to get exclusivity because UK competition law would prevent them from getting all the rights within the UK. The English Premiership has proven to be extremely popular abroad and what a perfect way that would be for Apple to get it's Apple TV into every country in the world.

Well, except the USA, where Comcast/NBC Sports signed a big deal a few years ago that lasts through 2028.

 

[enterthemerdaverse]

Whoever gets streaming rights will have a hell of a time dealing with the organized crime who are rife in this division and are sometimes sponsoring teams from some anonymous shell corporations. They even ask the footballers to promote their scams to fans. The managers and team owners are corrupt inside out and many taking bribes and dirty money.

 

[Marbles1]

It's really annoying having to pay for 3 separate channels to watch the sport you love, and even then it isn't even every match. Now we could potentially have 4.

I would love there to just be one with all the rights, don't care if that's Apple Sky etc. But I guess the premier league being as greedy as they are will not allow it.

At some point in the next 10 years, I can see the Premier league and bigger teams wanting something more like the NFL's model, where they have more of an ownership over the streaming and get to keep ALL of the revenue. For now, hawking out packages to a few streamers and cable TV companies brings in a lot of revenue, but at some point they're going to want the benefit of having a direct relationship with customers.

I doubt they will EVER have 'watch all of purely your team's games for £x but I can certainly see a 'watch everything' package and various bundles. Just think of that lovely regular direct debit / card transaction money going straight to the premier league. And they can market it globally, directly. All the opportunities to upsell. Charging more for certain games and all that. And all wrapped up in a single Premier League app.

A wise move for apple would be to get in early, and become the partner to achieve this.

 

[CarAnalogy]

It's really annoying having to pay for 3 separate channels to watch the sport you love, and even then it isn't even every match. Now we could potentially have 4.

I would love there to just be one with all the rights, don't care if that's Apple Sky etc. But I guess the premier league being as greedy as they are will not allow it.

Seems to be the trend with everything people like enough to pay these days. Everyone is squeezing as much as they can.

 

[kiranmk2]

At some point in the next 10 years, I can see the Premier league and bigger teams wanting something more like the NFL's model, where they have more of an ownership over the streaming and get to keep ALL of the revenue. For now, hawking out packages to a few streamers and cable TV companies brings in a lot of revenue, but at some point they're going to want the benefit of having a direct relationship with customers.

I doubt they will EVER have 'watch all of purely your team's games for £x but I can certainly see a 'watch everything' package and various bundles. Just think of that lovely regular direct debit / card transaction money going straight to the premier league. And they can market it globally, directly. All the opportunities to upsell. Charging more for certain games and all that. And all wrapped up in a single Premier League app.

A wise move for apple would be to get in early, and become the partner to achieve this.

Agree with this - very surprised the Premier League haven't considered this approach. They know what fans will pay so by cutting out the middle man (Sky, BT etc) they could keep more of the money and simply get a streaming app onto TVs and devices. I do see an options such as subscriptions to view individual teams becoming a thing.

This is pretty much an existential threat to Sky at this point - if they lost the EPL, their number of sports subscribers would drop through the floor, so if Apple was mulling acquiring the bulk of the UK rights Sky will likely fight to the last £ they can borrow.

I also think it's time for the ban of airing 3pm Saturday games should be lifted - given the grounds are packed for the games that do air I don't think there is any risk of losing live crowds these days.

 

[WWPD]

Did you see that ludicrous display last night?

 

[ThunderSkunk]

It’d be nice if Apple would take the exclusive rights to cover the Olympics away from NBC, since NBC is so abysmally bad at it. About three olympics’ses ago was the last time I got an “I tried to watch it. …but couldn’t.” out of anyone. Way to go, nbc. The IOC is a corrupt & unethical organization, but then so are FIFA and Twitter, so clearly Apple has no problem supporting orgs like this if there’s money to be made.