It’s been six days since Disney and YouTube TV came together to end their two-week carriage dispute that left YouTube TV subscribers without Disney-owned networks during the heart of football season. And little by little, details about the nature of their agreement are coming to light.
We already know the broad strokes. YouTube TV will get to “ingest” all content available within the new ESPN app, including content that was formerly housed on ESPN+, and content that is now exclusive to the ESPN “Unlimited” tier (namely WWE premium live events). Disney will also allow YouTube TV to offer its networks in genre-specific “skinny bundles,” paving the way for the Google-owned platform to offer a slimmed down sports package.
In return, we know that Disney was able to secure some form of price increase, the exact details of which rarely (if ever) get revealed publicly. In addition, Disney was able to keep its entertainment content from being ingested into YouTube TV a la the sports programming, which protects Disney+ and Hulu as standalone streaming services.
Now, Alex Sherman of CNBC is reporting even more granular details about the deal.
In his Thursday morning newsletter, Sherman reports that Disney got a couple concessions from YouTube TV that were previously not known. First, YouTube TV did not get the “sliding-scale rate improvement” it wanted when it surpassed the other top pay TV distributors by subscriber count. Awful Announcing previously reported, before a deal was reached, that YouTube TV had agreed to match the current rates paid by other top distributors, but wanted to codify lower rates once it became the largest. It seems that Disney won that battle, and YouTube TV’s rates will remain the same throughout the term of the deal.
Second, YouTube TV will be paying a per-subscriber fee to ingest ESPN Unlimited content within its platform. While not previously known, this was to be expected. Industry analysts suggested shortly after ESPN launched its new all-in-one app this year that it would be treated similarly to any of its linear cable networks during distribution negotiations. Just as YouTube TV has to quibble over the per-subscriber price of SEC Network, it’d have to similarly negotiate a per-subscriber price on ESPN Unlimited. This allows Disney to try and replicate the economics of the cable bundle for the streaming era. In practice, this is similar to a company like Charter negotiating a wholesale price for ESPN+.
Sherman also reveals one more nugget that could’ve sped up the timeline for Disney and YouTube TV to reach a deal. At the end of the month, the Disney-owned pay TV service Fubo is headed for a carriage dispute with NBCUniversal. Had Disney’s negotiation with YouTube TV stretched until then, Disney would’ve had the unfortunate situation of arguing for the content provider in the YouTube TV dispute, and against the content provider in a potential Fubo-NBC dispute. That wouldn’t have been great for an optics battle that Disney was already decisively losing.
About Drew Lerner
Drew Lerner is a staff writer for Awful Announcing and an aspiring cable subscriber. He previously covered sports media for Sports Media Watch. Future beat writer for the Oasis reunion tour.