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The sports streaming service Fubo has temporarily fended off a huge financial threat from Disney-Fox-Warner\u2019s potential competitor Venu Sports and its collection of sports broadcasting licenses thanks to a recent court ruling. A federal judge in the Southern District of New York granted Fubo\u2019s request for an injunction in its antitrust case against the joint sports streaming venture and its parent companies.<\/p>\n
US District Judge Margaret Garnett wrote in an opinion issued earlier today such a concentrated collection of media power would eliminate consumers\u2019 choices. The launch of Venu would also \u201chike prices on both consumers and other distributors\u201d and create a \u201cmulti-year monopolistic runway\u201d in the sports streaming sector for Disney, Fox and Warner.<\/p>\n
\u201cEven if the [joint venture] defendants swear that such price-hiking and competition excluding will not actually occur (though\u2026there is good reason to believe that it will),\u201d the opinion reads, \u201cone purpose of antitrust injunctions is to prevent anticompetitive incentives from forming in the first place so that American consumers do not have to simply take their word for it and hope for the best.\u201d<\/p>\n
Garnett also wrote the injunction is needed because of \u201cquintessential harms that money cannot adequately repair\u201d if Fox-Disney-Warner\u2019s Venu Sports moves forward.<\/p>\n
Fox-Disney-Warner first announced<\/a> its plans to launch a live sports streaming channel in February and later revealed the name and price<\/a> for its Venu Sports streaming service. The joint sports streaming venture will cost viewers $42.99 a month with a seven-day free trial and promises 14 channels of live sporting events with access to ESPN+ and four of its spinoff channels, the Fox network and both of its Fox Sports channels and a handful of Warner Bros. owned cable networks such as TNT and TruTV, according to a press release.<\/p>\n