Lachlan Murdoch delivered a brief elegy this morning for shuttered sports streaming joint venture Venu but said Fox is moving ahead with plans to launch a new direct-to-consumer service drawing on all its content and brands by the end of the calendar year.
There was no name given and few details. But, on a post-earnings call with Wall Street analysts, Murdoch said the parent of Fox Nation is working on something bigger designed to reach the large population of cord-cutters and cord-nevers who are not in the traditional cable bundle.
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He promised more later. But, asked if the upcoming service would include news – Fox News is going gangbusters — as well as sports, he said yes, that it will, in fact, be “holistic” of all of the company’s content.
This is a big deal for Fox, which has been adamant against rocking the cable bundle any more than absolutely necessary, if at all. Murdoch today continued to defended the bundle. He also indicated that the new service doesn’t have to clear additional rights.
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In his words: “We see the traditional cable bundle as, still, the most value for our customers and frankly the most value for the company. So we are huge supporters of the traditional cable bundle and will always be. But that said, we do want to reach consumer wherever they are and there is now a large population outside the traditional cable bundle, either cord-cutters or cord-nevers. And we are designing … an offering to really target those cord-cutter and cord-nevers that are not traditionally in the cable bundle.
“We do not want and we have no intention of turning a traditional distribution customer into a DTC customer. So our subscriber expectations will be modest and we are going to price the service accordingly.”
“With these modest expectations, we do not expect any exclusive rights costs or additional incremental rights costs. This service will be a package of our existing content and existing brands targeted to consumers who are not currently in the bundle. So the incremental cost will be relatively low, certainly relative to what our peers … are spending in the space.”