Netflix and F1, TNT and Six Nations, DAZN and France; Streamer Financials; TGL Ratings
The notes from The Bundle podcast, by Murray Barnett and Yannick Ramcke
Will Netflix acquire F1 US Media rights?
https://www.blackbookmotorsport.com/news/netflix-f1-us-tv-rights-espn-apple-february-2025/
https://www.nytimes.com/athletic/6120990/2025/02/07/formula-1-netflix-tv-espn/
https://www.autosport.com/f1/news/could-netflixs-involvement-in-f1-change-how-it-is-broadcast/10694371/
https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/netflixs-f1-gambit-streaming-giant-eyes-its-first-carlo-de-marchis-tnvyf/?trackingId=gzEbRFP2SYWg%2FwUGCKNKiA%3D%3D
https://frontofficesports.com/netflix-exploring-bid-formula-one-rights-in-us-starting-2026/
What happened
F1 has enjoyed a surge in popularity in US in part due to “Drive to Survive”
800 million viewers across six seasons (approx. 260m in US)
ESPN F1 Broadcast partner since 2018, renewed in 2022. Fees have gone from low single digit millions to high double digit millions per season.
Netflix is evaluating a bid for the US media rights to Formula One, according to a report from The Times.
Netflix is in live sports market with ‘celebrity’ boxing , NFL, Fifa Women’s World Cup and WWE
ESPN until end of 2025 season (around US$80m/year). Exclusive negotiation period has expired.
Why is matters
F1 has doubled its viewership since 2018, the first year that ESPN took over the F1 rights from NBC. ESPN networks averaged 550,000 viewers for the motorsport in 2018, and has hit at least 1.1 million viewers per season for the last three years.
In 2024 Netflix hired Kate Jackson, ESPN’s former vice-president of production who oversaw its F1 output, as its new director of sports to look after its live sports projects moving forward. – IMPORTANT
Highly experienced motorsport producer (+ other sports)
Streamers getting v active in live sports rights:
Amazon Prime Video NFL Thursday Night Football in 2021,
Apple TV signed a deal with MLS in 2022
Peacock Premier League - 2021
High expectations Apple will be interested with launch of Brad Pitt F1 movie in 2025. Seems unlikely.
Interesting speculation on changes in presentation style Netflix could bring
integrate race coverage with Drive to Survive-style content, creating a more narrative-driven approach to live sports broadcasting.
Interactive features that traditional broadcasters can't match
Other innovations (both the norm when changing broadcast partner but also a feature of the new streamers style.
Where’s it going
Stock markets seems to like Netflix Sports strategy – could lead to more acquisitions
Makes sense for Netflix because:
F1 rights are relatively cheap ($90+ million/season for 25 races) – Amazon pay circa $1 bn/year for Thursday night NFL games.
Live sports bring predictable, weekly engagement that could reduce churn
Advertising potential is significant - live sports command premium ad rates
DTS gives ‘predisposed audience’ to Netflix
F1 will like Netflix because:
Creates competitive marketplace
DTS is plateauing and they want to continue partnership with Netflix (possibly around live sports but also other sports adjacent content)
Netflix has younger viewer profile (than network/ESPN)
Sarandos comments:
“We believe that the live events business is where we really want to be and sports is a very important part of that but it is a part of that expansion,”
Netflix would be “mindful of the bottom line” when it came to future rights acquisitions “It’s really important that those economics do work,” he added. “And the big league sports, full league, full season economics, are very hard to make work.”
“If there was a path where we could actually make the economics work, for both us and the leagues, we would certainly explore [it],”
Will be a number of parties at the table – ESPN, Netflix, Amazon (longer shot) + networks
Important because:
Could be a signal as to Netflix desire for ‘traditional annual sports series’
Signal different approach to broadcasting sportsNetflix hits 300+m subs thanks to sport
Sources
https://frontofficesports.com/netflix-stock-soars-as-sports-help-it-exceed-300m-subscribers/
https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/netflixs-strategic-push-live-sports-shows-early-carlo-de-marchis-lg84f/
https://www.sportico.com/business/finance/2025/netflix-earnings-sports-events-1234824814/
https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/tellynomics-35-darts-flies-euro-rugby-french-football-mike-darcey-xjoee/?trackingId=N9Bg%2BsIv0rsRjnZ%2BPVX3bg%3D%3D
What happened
DAZN wants to renegotiate in France
Sources
https://www.sportspro.com/broadcast-ott/media-rights/dazn-ligue-1-tv-deal-january-2025/
https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/tellynomics-35-darts-flies-euro-rugby-french-football-mike-darcey-xjoee/?trackingId=0fzyKthJ0i4azlVlOHKzIQ%3D%3D
https://www.footboom1.com/en/news/football/2314794-dazn-s-struggles-highlight-ongoing-tv-rights-crisis-in-ligue-1
What happened
DAZN is reportedly in talks with LFP to renegotiate its €400M/year Ligue 1 TV rights deal
Approx 500K subscribers gained vs. min 1.5M needed for ROI (with lower price point than initially planned)
DAZN may activate an exit clause by December 2025 if subscriber targets aren't met
BeIN Sports may also exit
French paper L'EQUIPE has reported DAZN are looking into a legal loophole to stop their contract asap. “They have a clause where they can stop their contract at the end of the season if figures are low but they would like to cut the losses asap and are looking at how responsible the League could be... In my opinion, their original offer was out of this world for subscribers and everything they have done to improve the value (aka price promotions) have failed to attract additional income...”
Why it matters
Len Blavatnik has had to invest a further US$827m into DAZN
Revenues expected to surpass US$6bn in 2025 but operating loss of US$830m for 2023.
Current agreements with DAZN and BeIN already represent a 12.3% reduction compared to previous agreement
French clubs facing potential €1.2B combined losses due to lower broadcast revenue
Rampant piracy is poisoning the French market
5.1% of the French population uses illegal IPTV services (according to 2022 study by the AAPA -Audiovisual Anti-Piracy Alliance).
Where it’s going
Pierre Maes on LinkedIn - The irony is that the exit clause was introduced at the clubs request. The very same clause that is today placing DAZN in a very favorable position, enjoying the comfort of many options.
LFP is preparing for the worst-case scenario exploring the possibility of launching its own channel, although the financial ramifications for French clubs remain uncertain.
TNT cools on Six Nations
Sources
https://www.cityam.com/can-rugby-union-and-the-six-nations-survive-behind-tnt-paywall/
https://www.broadcastnow.co.uk/broadcasting/tnt-sports-responds-to-six-nations-rights-bid-rumours/5201180.article
https://www.walesonline.co.uk/sport/rugby/rugby-news/six-nations-games-set-go-30871235
What happened
Tender expected shortly - With a £100 million valuation placed on the tournament - £10 million more than the BBC and ITV have been paying - there has long been speculation that it could move to a subscription channel from 2026
A combination of BBC and ITV – as well as Welsh speaking S4C – share the UK media rights having beaten off Sky Sports in their private bid in 2015
Will TNT come in?
Why it matters
Not a listed event - elements are protected but not the entirety of the offering. Other events in this category are Wimbledon matches preceding the finals and the Ryder Cup, which has minimal free-to-air coverage outside of highlights.
TNT Sports can theoretically, then, show all 15 matches behind a paywall and offer extended highlights to FTA in a Match of the Day format. It is unlikely but possible.
Where its going
A battle between reach and revenue. Although reduction in technical reach may not be as disastrous as it could appear.
Also battle between tradition and modern thinking. Older generation who govern the game resistant to change
Rugby Pass – “At best, the new TV deal will be a hybrid of subscription and free-to-air live coverage, with ITV Sport likely to be TNT Sport’s most probable partner unless the BBC can secure some kind of ‘sweetheart’ deal with the Six Nations committee."
TGL’s US Ratings
Source
https://www.sportsbusinessjournal.com/Articles/2025/01/28/Newsletters/Unpacks/tgl%20tiger%20rory%20viewership?publicationSource=newsletters&issue=1f30f14f3ae3480e9112190014fa7b0c&utm_source=sbj&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=newsletter_unpackslite
What happened
The fourth match for TGL on Monday night was up 27% from Week 3 (a Tuesday airing) in the league's first meeting of Tiger Woods' and Rory McIlroy's teams, but down slightly from the comparable ESPN window on the same Monday night last year, which featured a Duke-Virginia Tech men’s hoops game, reports SBJ's Austin Karp.
ESPN drew 864,000 viewers in the 6:30pm ET window as Tiger Woods’ Jupiter Links beat Rory McIlroy’s Boston Common Golf in overtime. The match peaked at 1.1 million from 8:30-8:44pm ET in that OT window. TGL was up from 682,000 viewers in Week 3 (no Woods, no McIlroy), but down from Woods’ debut in Week 2 (1 million) and down from the TGL debut (919,000).
TGL is now averaging 874,000 viewers after four weeks. That’s up 33% compared to the comparable four college basketball games in the same windows last January (658,000 viewers for those games).
TGL also was well above another “new league” on Monday night, scoring more than 4x the audience for Unrivaled on TNT/truTV (Vinyl-Lunar Owls drew 134,000 in the 730pm ET window, while Roses-Laces drew 192,000 in the 8:45pm ET window).
ESPN and TGL will return to its Tuesday window in Week 5. The sides had to make a decision on an earlier window this week in order to get many players out to Pebble Beach for this week’s PGA Tour event. TGL is then back on Monday with a tripleheader on Presidents Day (Feb. 17). It alternates between Mondays and Tuesdays then the rest of the season.
Streamers financial results
Sources
https://frontofficesports.com/comcast-stock-falls-but-peacock-and-sports-rights-provide-hope/
https://frontofficesports.com/disney-earnings-highlight-espn-comeback-iger-high-on-nbas-future/
Peacock
Parent company Comcast report mixed results however saw a 28% revenue surge with from Peacock to $1.3 billion
Peacock has 36 million subscribers, flat from Comcast’s third-quarter results.
Losses fell to $372 million, less than half the comparable total for the prior-year period and down from a $436 million loss in the third quarter.
No major churn following the subscriber boosts seen during and immediately after the Paris Olympics.
Investors were still rather displeased with Comcast cable and broadband subscriber losses sent stock down 11% to a 52-week low of $33.25 per share.
“We’re not really running a Peacock-only strategy. We’re running a broadcast-plus-streaming strategy, and looking to optimize that over the years ahead,” said Comcast president Mike Cavanagh
Read – managing cable decline – will eventually be almost exclusively streaming
ESPN
ESPN, was flat in revenue at $4.85 billion, but segment operating income reversed from a $103 million loss in the comparable period a year ago to a $247 million gain. Now projecting a 13% growth in operating income during the current fiscal year.
Iger comments on bundling strategy for ESPN - “The goal all along with ESPN is to make it as accessible as possible, and in as many ways as possible.. Some will want to consume it just through an app, some as part of the more traditional expanded basic bundle, and some will migrate in the direction of skinnier bundles, or sports bundles only. We plan to take advantage of the emergence of these bundles.”
Codename Flagship - launching Q3 2025
Distillation of ESPN services including multiscreen viewing, full integration with ESPN Bet, ticketing, merchandising, and fantasy content.
The shoulder experience around the video will be much more interactive and it will be much more personalized
Netflix
Netflix now has 301.6 million global subscribers, up from 282.7 million in October, and that it generated a 16% lift in revenue to $10.2 billion. Net income roughly doubled from the comparable period in 2023 to nearly $1.9 billion. The subscriber increase, more than double what analysts expected, is the single-largest quarterly gain in company history.
Why do we care
Q4 results could be attributed to sports – they had Xmas day double header (av 24m) and Tyson v Jake Paul (60 HH’s tuned it)
NFL Xmas games – “the Netflix version of a Xmas sugar rush” – Mike Darcey
Q1 sees start of WWE Raw exclusive to Netflix
For 2025, Netflix told analysts it is expecting to generate revenue around $44 billion, about 13% higher than 2024, with slightly better profit margins.
2027/31 FIFA Women’s World Cup
“We’re not focusing on acquiring rights to large regular-season sports packages; rather, our live strategy is all about delivering can’t-miss, special-event programming,” Netflix said in a letter to shareholders. “Although our live programming will likely be a small percentage of our total view hours and content expense, we think the eventized nature will result in outsized value to both our members and our business.”
“…if there was a path where we could actually make the economics work for both us and the league, we certainly would explore. But right now, we believe that the live events business is where we really want to be,” - Ted Sarandos
Allows Netflix to maintain cost discipline while stull capturing high value sporting events.
“They have found a sustainable approach to sports content that could drive further growth without compromising profitability” – Carlo de Marchis
Q4 2025 was last quarter Netflix will disclose subscriber totals – coincidence?
Also rolled out US price increases across most of its plans, with individual tiers generally rising by $1 to $2.50 per month.
Where its going
Lots of changes at Netflix – Sports entry was undoubtedly a push to rapidly grow subs base with launch of ad tier. Launch of ad tier is also a contributing factor to them no longer reporting subs on a quarterly basis.
They will be expanding markets with ad tiers and 2025 will be a focus of delivering significant scale (to advertisiers)
Investors like what they are seeing with Netflix sports investments - stock up by more than 13% in early January and nearly 80% in the last year