Posted on 10/29/125 by Bob Magee
As Disney and Google enter a public carriage battle over
distribution on YouTube TV, it appears Disney avoided a
dispute with another major pay TV provider.
According to a recent report by John Ourand of Puck, Disney
and Comcast “quietly” renewed a distribution agreement
earlier this month, keeping Disney-owned channels, including
the ESPN family of networks, on Comcast’s Xfinity cable
systems without disruption. However, there’s at least one
wrinkle to the new agreement that is still being sorted out.
Despite the new agreement, Xfinity customers still do not
have access to authenticate into the highest tier of ESPN’s
new direct-to-consumer app, ESPN Unlimited. Awful Announcing
has learned that the delay is due to work being done on the
product’s tech side to accommodate Xfinity subscribers,
according to a source familiar with the matter. The source
did not provide any timeline for the completion of the tech
work.
Prior to the app’s launch in September, ESPN’s stated goal
was to provide seamless authentication into ESPN Unlimited
for any traditional bundle subscribers. The idea was that
ESPN would be agnostic to whichever way one purchased the
network’s content. Buy it through a pay TV bundle? Great,
here’s authentication access for the app. Buy it through
ESPN directly? That’s great too.
ESPN Unlimited, which runs consumers about $30 per month
when purchased directly from the network, includes access to
all of ESPN’s linear networks, all ESPN+ exclusive content,
and, crucially, new content like WWE Premium Live Events
that are exclusive to ESPN Unlimited.
However, major carriers like Xfinity and YouTube TV, which
combine account for about 20 million subscribers, are still
unable to offer their customers full access to ESPN’s app.
The delay being tech-related would seem to indicate that
ESPN is preparing for an influx of new users from both
Xfinity and YouTube TV, assuming Disney and Google are able
to reach a similar distribution deal in the coming days.
Last month, an ESPN executive assured gathered media that
the “vast majority” of pay TV subscribers would have access
to ESPN Unlimited by year’s end. ESPN hasn’t exactly
inspired confidence on that front so far, with Xfinity and
YouTube TV still on the outside looking in.
It is encouraging, however, that Disney and Comcast were
able to reach an agreement that included ESPN Unlimited
access for its subscribers. So far, ESPN has been correct in
its assertion that any new distribution deals the company
strikes will include authentication into the app’s Unlimited
tier. The next test, of course, will be with Google’s
YouTube TV.