Mobile phone companies are cooling on the idea of buying exclusive rights to Premier League football matches, in contrast with the expected battle to show live games on television that gets under way next week.
BSkyB and mobile phone operators 3 and Vodafone paid £100m for the internet and mobile phone rights to Premier League matches in 2003. That deal runs out at the end of next season. But since the rights were sold, a new generation of mobile data services, including news alerts and club-specific services, have sprung up which have made exclusive access to highlights a less valuable commodity. SkySports News is even available as a streamed TV channel on some handsets, giving football fans all the news they need
Bob Fuller, chief executive of 3, said: "We will have to have a look at it [buying up the rights]. But our position will be 'do we really think that exclusivity is worth paying lots of money for?' because football is something you can get virtually anywhere now."
Vodafone is also reluctant to spend millions of pounds fighting for exclusive access to football, while O2 is interested in partnering with other operators to offer football clips.
"You are not going to see the operators fighting tooth and nail to get hold of exclusive rights this time," said one mobile industry insider.
3 gets roughly half a million downloads of football clips from 5pm to 7pm on Saturday evenings, but the traffic is nowhere near as high across the rest of the week. The company intends to keep football as part of its content proposition but is looking at working with others in the mobile industry when it comes to picking up the rights.
http://business.guardian.co.uk/story/0,,1757019,00.html
BSkyB and mobile phone operators 3 and Vodafone paid £100m for the internet and mobile phone rights to Premier League matches in 2003. That deal runs out at the end of next season. But since the rights were sold, a new generation of mobile data services, including news alerts and club-specific services, have sprung up which have made exclusive access to highlights a less valuable commodity. SkySports News is even available as a streamed TV channel on some handsets, giving football fans all the news they need
Bob Fuller, chief executive of 3, said: "We will have to have a look at it [buying up the rights]. But our position will be 'do we really think that exclusivity is worth paying lots of money for?' because football is something you can get virtually anywhere now."
Vodafone is also reluctant to spend millions of pounds fighting for exclusive access to football, while O2 is interested in partnering with other operators to offer football clips.
"You are not going to see the operators fighting tooth and nail to get hold of exclusive rights this time," said one mobile industry insider.
3 gets roughly half a million downloads of football clips from 5pm to 7pm on Saturday evenings, but the traffic is nowhere near as high across the rest of the week. The company intends to keep football as part of its content proposition but is looking at working with others in the mobile industry when it comes to picking up the rights.
http://business.guardian.co.uk/story/0,,1757019,00.html