As Disney looks to make Disney+ the hub for its direct-to-consumer business, the company will add more sports programming to the platform.
That was the word from Disney CEO Josh D’Amaro and CFO Hugh Johnston Wednesday in the company’s quarterly earnings call. D’Amaro noted that ESPN had its most watched fiscal Q3 in a decade, thanks to big increases for the NBA Finals and the NHL’s Stanley Cup Final.
“As we evolve D+ we’ll continue to bring select premium sports events to the platform,” D’Amaro said on a call with investment analysts. “Live sports aren’t just a viewership play, they’re a fan engagement and ecosystem play. When a sports fan engages with ESPN, Disney+ or our parks, their lifetime value [to Disney] increases.”
The uptick in sports content on Disney+ will begin in the fall, with an increase in simulcasts of college football games from recent years. The streamer will continue to simulcast ESPN’s College Gameday pregame show.
“Our strategy on Disney+ is to bring additional sports content to Disney+ users and drive additional upsell into Disney+, Hulu and the ESPN Unlimited bundle,” CFO Hugh Johnston said on the call. “You can expect us to lean in in all of these areas.”
D’Amaro also noted that the continued roiling of the media business — including Comcast’s plans to spin off NBCUniversal and Fox’s acquisition of Roku — could be opportunities for Disney to strengthen its business.
“A more consolidated industry is a better investment backdrop,” said D’Amaro. “We have a long history of partnering in streaming, and we believe we can keep building on that. … The real differentiator is our ability to segment the marketplace through bundling in a way that I don’t think our competitors can really do, at least domestically. If you look at customers who’ve been with us for a similar length of time, retention improves the further up the ladder they go from a single product up to a dual bundle to the trio bundle. We’re in a good position.”
