MUMBAI: The rise of streaming is bringing major sporting events to a global audience and pushing up media rights revenues. This will drive media sport rights revenues up 75% over the period 2018 till 2025 from $48.6 billion to $85.1 billion, according to a study from Rethink TV, the specialist video forecasting arm of Rethink Technology Research.
The study – ‘Globalization Lifts TV Sports Rights Past $85 Billion Future, Sports Rights Forecast to 2025 – traces revenue changes from media rights for major sports and their leagues in the principal geographies of Europe, North America, China, Rest of Asia Pacific and Rest of World, drilling down into differences by region and sport.
The report observes that football will increase its already dominant share of that pie from 25.1% ($12.8 billion) in 2018 to 37.4% ($31.9 billion), primarily through increased viewership of Europe’s top leagues in other regions, especially Asia Pacific, including China, and North America.
The study finds that other sports, notably basketball, will also benefit from the fan base expansion generated by globalization and greater streaming distribution.
A strong subtext of the report is that direct-to-consumer services are creeping up on the sports rights industry, “stealthily with deadly intent” for broadcasters. Technology giants such as Amazon, which are now disrupting the traditional field of sporting rights, will themselves have to adapt to the growing reality of D2C if they are to have a future as major players in sports video distribution.
The maturation of streaming is now bringing another major gear shift, both by intensifying competition for rights and changing the viewing experience, with greater levels of personalization and interactivity, as well as innovations in presentation with the proliferation of ancillary content.
Availability of audience data linked to advanced analytics has created the potential for making changes in the sports themselves, considering fans behavior during viewing, as has occurred in the case of basketball in the USA.
There is also growing appreciation that sports rights are part of a bigger picture that includes fan participation and the other sources of sports monetization for the leagues or ultimate rights owners. The partnership between Discovery and PGA Golf is an example of connecting premium rights with fan participation.
Rethink also sees the availability of audience data linked to advanced analytics as having created the potential for making changes in the sports themselves, considering fans behaviour during viewing, as has occurred in the case of basketball in the USA. It also cited a growing appreciation that sports rights are part of a bigger picture that includes fan participation and the other sources of sports monetisation for the leagues or ultimate rights owners. The partnership between Discovery and PGA Golf is an example of connecting premium rights with fan participation.
The big downside however, is that streaming is increasingly driving piracy to the extent that content protection has become a factor in the rights auctions alongside the quality of viewing experience so that contracts no longer go automatically to the highest bidder.
