After becoming a lightning rod for antitrust scrutiny, streaming service Venu Sports is dead. But with pay-TV cord-cutting showing no signs of stopping, and streamers finally starting to turn the corner on profitability, the era of “re-bundling” is just getting started.
Venu was designed to target “cord never” households looking to find their sports all in one place, but the offering notably lacked programming from NBC and CBS and was weakened by Warner Bros. Discovery’s loss of its NBA rights. It also drew scrutiny from pay TV providers like DirecTV, Dish Network and Fubo, who argued that Venu was offering flexibility for skinnier bundles that they’d been hoping to give consumers themselves but couldn’t under previous carriage deals.