2023-2028 next tv deal discussion

[Perth Red]

And there we have it (if he is right!)

In fact, legal sources say the current TV contracts do not obligate the NRL to take a cut. When the former NRL CEO, Todd Greenberg, went to Nine boss Marks and pointed out the 2018-22 contract did not even require the NRL to takes less in this Covid-19 interrupted season, it was the end of his rugby league career.

I like Roy, he is the only Journo not afraid to question motives and alternative scenarios.

There is a digital channel war coming in same way we had the satellite war. The difference today is that people swap and change digital subscriptions much more readily when they feel they have watched what interests them. There are only two things that can reduce the churn:
live sports and TV series that attracts large followers such as GoT. Sport will once again be the jewel in the service crown to keep subscribers. Fox just got an absolute cracking deal. Pay less whilst locking up Australia's most watched sport for 7 years whilst the digital war rages. In many ways this may be more costly to NRL than FTA. In two years we could have 4 or 5 big digital channels all battling for sports rights to hold on to the Australian market. It's likely ads will start to form a major part of revenue for digital services in not to distant future and with Australians high disposable income level advertising is potentially worth more than subscriptions on this platform in this country.

FTA is in decline, money isnt going to be there and frankly we should be planning for how we fill the hole that it will leave in coming years. Sadly that will not now be by creating market competition for streaming rights. We have streaming services like DAZN and ESPN+ paying billions for sports deals at the moment. If anything it puts the imperative on RL to really push itself globally allowing SL and NRL to produce own content and sell to multiple streamers in different parts of world within the next decade. Will the NRL have the vision to see this I wonder?

 

[colly]

Roy in fantasy land when he goes onto the winning bid for the
Foxtel Warner/HBO extension deal. What was Nines offer, Roy?

70 million dollars or maybe 90 million for the HBO media deal. . So by counter argument.
Nines should not get a discount for the out years as
they (Nine) bid $90 million on a failed bid- so they ,

Nine can now pay par or contract amount for the NRL this year and the rest of their NRL contract.

Quote-"Fox reportedly ( how does he know) paid two and a half times more than
last time for HBO movies to stream on their new over
the top service, Binge.

The monies News Corp paid for HBO in a bidding war
with Nine's Stan raises the question why NRL must take
less, as V'landys has repeatedly insisted." End of quote

So Nine have a spare $90 million now lying around- pay
up now to the NRL.

The monies News Corp paid for HBO in a bidding war
with Nine's Stan raises the question why NRL must take
less, as V'landys has repeatedly insisted.

So Nine have a spare $90 million now lying around from it's failed bid- pay
up now to the NRL.

In regards to Roy's legal advice from the Legal Partners
f**kem and Stuff-em- Somehow not providing product is
not a actionable item which Nine could renegotiate this year. Why not extend the season into Summer/Jan into a no ratings period- No problems says f**kem and Stuff-em.

Finally Roy's brother Chris did a Four Corners piece, it was the greatest stitch-up on Rugby League. EVER! Typically ABC production people darkened out, speaking anonymously, secret witnesses, scary music, black and white footage. Fake intentional plots, National revolutions and the Great Gold Heist. Ruby league fanatics was going to rob the Central Bank of the Phillipines. Or so they say.

- this piece just reminds me of this.

 

[Perth Red]

Current crowded streaming market in Australia

Netflix
Disney+
Stan
Amazon Prime
Binge
Foxtel Now
Kayo (sports)
Apple TV
Youtube Premium
10 All Access
Hayu (reality TV)
Acorn TV (english TV)


on the horizon
DAZN (sports)
?HBO+ in 5 years

 

[tri_colours]

Fox will pay 1.4B over the next 7 years. While CH 9 will pay 300m over the next 3 years and are yet to commit past 2022. Is this correct?

 

[Perth Red]

Ch 9 then:
“But this health crisis in our community has highlighted the mismanagement of the code over many years.”
“Nine has invested hundreds of millions in this game over decades and we now find they have profoundly wasted those funds with very little to fall back on"
“It would now appear that much of that has been squandered"

Ch9 now: err we cant afford you, signed a sht deal and now are going broke. Can we please pay less?" F**k you Ch9! Come on Ch10 you've got a year to get a good bid together.

 

[Perth Red]

Fox will pay 1.4B over the next 7 years. While CH 9 will pay 300m over the next 3 years and are yet to commit past 2022. Is this correct?

We don't know yet. Fox also pay Ch9 for simucast of their games and the Saturday night game that Ch9 originally purchased. If the $1.7bill is to be believed it is 2020-2026 of Fox funding and 20-22 from Ch9.

 

[taipan]

And there we have it (if he is right!)

In fact, legal sources say the current TV contracts do not obligate the NRL to take a cut. When the former NRL CEO, Todd Greenberg, went to Nine boss Marks and pointed out the 2018-22 contract did not even require the NRL to takes less in this Covid-19 interrupted season, it was the end of his rugby league career.

I like Roy, he is the only Journo not afraid to question motives and alternative scenarios.

There is a digital channel war coming in same way we had the satellite war. The difference today is that people swap and change digital subscriptions much more readily when they feel they have watched what interests them. There are only two things that can reduce the churn:
live sports and TV series that attracts large followers such as GoT. Sport will once again be the jewel in the service crown to keep subscribers. Fox just got an absolute cracking deal. Pay less whilst locking up Australia's most watched sport for 7 years whilst the digital war rages. In many ways this may be more costly to NRL than FTA. In two years we could have 4 or 5 big digital channels all battling for sports rights to hold on to the Australian market. It's likely ads will start to form a major part of revenue for digital services in not to distant future and with Australians high disposable income level advertising is potentially worth more than subscriptions on this platform in this country.

FTA is in decline, money isnt going to be there and frankly we should be planning for how we fill the hole that it will leave in coming years. Sadly that will not now be by creating market competition for streaming rights. We have streaming services like DAZN and ESPN+ paying billions for sports deals at the moment. If anything it puts the imperative on RL to really push itself globally allowing SL and NRL to produce own content and sell to multiple streamers in different parts of world within the next decade. Will the NRL have the vision to see this I wonder?

Roy questions, always has, yet on 24th May he did a bit of Murdoch promotion suggesting "With NRL in a league of its won ,Fox must make it the world game" and proceeded to comment about Lachlan Murdoch and his influence there.

That "no obligation statement his hardly a scoop" but what is happening in this country and throughout the world's not something that happens like a short time disaster.How many contracts were changed in WW2,or cancelled or during the depression years?

FTA is indeed in decline and subscription Tv is hardly setting the world on fire.So you have no FTA income certainty from 2023 ,but at least have financial certainty for Foxtel in a situation that is going to be extremely tough for at least 5-10 years.
The thought of waiting till 2023 ,and being optimistic for negotiations that somehow the economy is going to change (bearing in mind negotiations would have to take place end of next year latest)IOW a bit over 12 months is living in la la land.
According to the RBA we'll have unemployment over 8% in 2021.

Greenberg was not flicked just because he supposedly pointed out something to Skid Marks.
There were issues with NRL clubs and regional areas, that were ignored by him.You get the clubs offside you've got a problem.The annual accounts themselves which you have criticised ,did not help, with a lot of vague figures or generalisations.$80m in loans form broadcasters that were not evident.

NRL retained the digital apparently,neither Ch9 nor Foxtel got it.Good.

We can bang on about a lower deal for Foxtel for 7 years ,but that's still 7 years of a set revenue that offers some security, when conditions in this country could in fact get worse.Why? China is playing hard ball on a number off our exports, they have committed large sums to their military and their Belt and Road initiative has taken a hammering because of the virus issues well as the virus issue in their own country.

Because of the trade war with the USA, the trade issue with our country and others, plus the effects of the virus they have used up large monetary resources and military spending.Now they find themselves in a situation they need to assist their own people who will be out of work as a result.

We don't know the full impact of China's banning or higher tariffs on our economy.We are a trading nation, and that includes tourism and university education, that employs huge numbers.People in large numbers will be affected if this continues.People out of work don't get Pay Tv,attend games, buy merchandise and restrict consumer goods.It's a right royal clustering*ck.

 

[Perth Red]

Comparing this to WW2? Really?

Unemployment was already over 5% pre covid and had anticipated to be over 8% in March this year regardless of Covid. When the last mega deal was done with tv Australias unemployment rate was 6.4% and tipped to go higher and it didnt seem to bother the TV companies then? If we hadnt had COVID and unemployment had continued to go up as predicted would the TV companies have demanded a reduction? Not likely!

I still dont believe that there was an $80 million "loan". there was a $100million advance, the two are quite different. The advance is being covered by annual reduced contract payments.

Whats lala land is to think that in 3-5 years time the world wont be largely back to normal and streaming service subscriptions wont be through the roof. Look at Kayo, in a short space of time it has more subscribers than Foxtel sports. The market is getting flodded as everyone wants a slice of the ballooning pie. We've handed Fox the streaming service content to beat off competitors for next 7 years, how much would they have paid for that opportunity in a year or two when DAZN, Disney (ESPN) etc are looking for market share sports leader content in Australia? It should have created a premium, instead we've sold it off cut price.

There will be a fTA contract from 2023, FTA isnt going away for a long while yet. It will undoubtedly be less but it will still be significant. Problem is we needed to generate media revenue in other ways to fill the gap but locking in Fox for such a long term has null and void any hope of that.

So they bloody well should retain the digital, there was absolutely no justification for handing it over. That's not a win, its a non negotiable!

You cant renegotiate the tv contract every time china gets the hump with us or Trump upsets Europe or Putin screws the oil price in case the tv companies struggle lol.

 

[ayatollah_murdoch]

Fox will pay 1.4B over the next 7 years. While CH 9 will pay 300m over the next 3 years and are yet to commit past 2022. Is this correct?

If those numbers are correct, then it does appear that Fox has got a bargain. A bit like NQ Cowboys signing JT for 10 year at 1m p.a. Seems great upfront, but the further you go, the worse it seems for one party.

I will reserve my judgement until the AFL deal is announced. The press suggests they will lose 100m p.a. on their TV rights which would take their broadcast right to circa $315m p.a. If the NRL gets $300m p.a. then its a great result given we have less teams (and the upside of an increase if there is expansion).

 

[Perth Red]

If those numbers are correct, then it does appear that Fox has got a bargain. A bit like NQ Cowboys signing JT for 10 year at 1m p.a. Seems great upfront, but the further you go, the worse it seems for one party.

I will reserve my judgement until the AFL deal is announced. The press suggests they will lose 100m p.a. on their TV rights which would take their broadcast right to circa $315m p.a. If the NRL gets $300m p.a. then its a great result given we have less teams (and the upside of an increase if there is expansion).

Last year we got around $325mill tv revenue (though around $20mill of that is Sky NZ and we havent heard anything about that contract in all this and was reduced from contract amount du eto pay back of some of the advance).
AFL got $397mill (but that included digital revenue of say around $30mill so around $367mill TV revenue)

So 2019 Australian generated real cash TV revenue =
NRL $305mill
AFL $367mill

 

[franklin2323]

If those numbers are correct, then it does appear that Fox has got a bargain. A bit like NQ Cowboys signing JT for 10 year at 1m p.a. Seems great upfront, but the further you go, the worse it seems for one party.

I will reserve my judgement until the AFL deal is announced. The press suggests they will lose 100m p.a. on their TV rights which would take their broadcast right to circa $315m p.a. If the NRL gets $300m p.a. then its a great result given we have less teams (and the upside of an increase if there is expansion).

Of course the forum whinger is sooking but no figures annouced yet. Nor have other codes done deals yet. Can’t say good or bad until both happen

 

[LeagueXIII]

If those numbers are correct, then it does appear that Fox has got a bargain. A bit like NQ Cowboys signing JT for 10 year at 1m p.a. Seems great upfront, but the further you go, the worse it seems for one party.

I will reserve my judgement until the AFL deal is announced. The press suggests they will lose 100m p.a. on their TV rights which would take their broadcast right to circa $315m p.a. If the NRL gets $300m p.a. then its a great result given we have less teams (and the upside of an increase if there is expansion).

I live in Melbourne and it is very quiet in the media on the AFL TV rights in comparison to the political circus ours were..

 

[The Mad Hatter]

We're all in this together.

 

[Phil McGrawhan]

I live in Melbourne and it is very quiet in the media on the AFL TV rights in comparison to the political circus ours were..

Ch 9/Fairfax don't have the rights to AFL .
They started the shitshow
That's why it was a media circus .

Whatever happens in Rl is played out in the media ..usually negatively

The afl has the protection of the Vicderpia media .

 

[Steel Saints]

Hi Everyone

Been a long time reader on this site. Always enjoyed the forum debate. Now I'll dip my toes into the snakepit.

Following this debate on tv rights, i do agree with both sides of the argument. On one side, League XIII and Perth Red are saying "why extend, just wait until the contract expires and go to the market?". But on the other side, Taipan has stated that having an extended deal with Fox, does bring the game some form of security in the next 6 or 7 years, even if it is a fraction less.

My view is the lesson the NRL needs to learn from this pandemic is to stop relying on broadcast revenue. It is a risky practice where every five years the game has to go cap in hand asking for money from arrogant, rude tv executives, even if it is from traditional media or new media like Optus, Facebook, Amazon etc.

Now here is the thing. The NRL did set up" Project Apollo" to get the game back on the field. Once we get back to some form of normality, I'd like to see the NRL set up another "Project Apollo". The goal would be to come up with ideas and strategy to generate non broadcast revenue.

A key part of that strategy could be centred around the digital arm. It does look like the game has retained it, otherwise shows like "Inside NRL" and "NRL teams" would not have returned over the last few days.

But anyway, let's wait and see after the tv deal is announced and we will go from there.

 

[Perth Red]

Hi Everyone

Been a long time reader on this site. Always enjoyed the forum debate. Now I'll dip my toes into the snakepit.

Following this debate on tv rights, i do agree with both sides of the argument. On one side, League XIII and Perth Red are saying "why extend, just wait until the contract expires and go to the market?". But on the other side, Taipan has stated that having an extended deal with Fox, does bring the game some form of security in the next 6 or 7 years, even if it is a fraction less.

My view is the lesson the NRL needs to learn from this pandemic is to stop relying on broadcast revenue. It is a risky practice where every five years the game has to go cap in hand asking for money from arrogant, rude tv executives, even if it is from traditional media or new media like Optus, Facebook, Amazon etc.

Now here is the thing. The NRL did set up" Project Apollo" to get the game back on the field. Once we get back to some form of normality, I'd like to see the NRL set up another "Project Apollo". The goal would be to come up with ideas and strategy to generate non broadcast revenue.

A key part of that strategy could be centred around the digital arm. It does look like the game has retained it, otherwise shows like "Inside NRL" and "NRL teams" would not have returned over the last few days.

But anyway, let's wait and see after the tv deal is announced and we will go from there.

welcome to the madhouse lol. Don’t think anyone would disagree and every ceo and chair since independence has continually talked about the need to maximise non media revenue. Tbf to Greenberg he didn’t do too bad a job and took the non media revenue from $129.2mill to $203.9mill. Biggest issue is every time the nrl wants to put aside money for investing in revenue growth it has to combat the clubs and leagues holding their hands out and the media saying its wasting money (a large part of the $’s media were complaining about in cost to run the game was in fact What the game spends generating revenue).
You can see from this graph from annualL report the revenue split has remained pretty consistent even going back to the crapper media deal of 2012.

 

[ayatollah_murdoch]

Hi Everyone

Been a long time reader on this site. Always enjoyed the forum debate. Now I'll dip my toes into the snakepit.

Following this debate on tv rights, i do agree with both sides of the argument. On one side, League XIII and Perth Red are saying "why extend, just wait until the contract expires and go to the market?". But on the other side, Taipan has stated that having an extended deal with Fox, does bring the game some form of security in the next 6 or 7 years, even if it is a fraction less.

My view is the lesson the NRL needs to learn from this pandemic is to stop relying on broadcast revenue. It is a risky practice where every five years the game has to go cap in hand asking for money from arrogant, rude tv executives, even if it is from traditional media or new media like Optus, Facebook, Amazon etc.

Now here is the thing. The NRL did set up" Project Apollo" to get the game back on the field. Once we get back to some form of normality, I'd like to see the NRL set up another "Project Apollo". The goal would be to come up with ideas and strategy to generate non broadcast revenue.

A key part of that strategy could be centred around the digital arm. It does look like the game has retained it, otherwise shows like "Inside NRL" and "NRL teams" would not have returned over the last few days.

But anyway, let's wait and see after the tv deal is announced and we will go from there.

NRL clubs are lazy when it comes to revenue raising initiatives. Years of leagues club grants and now TV broadcasting revenue along with a generally inept Commission has meant much of the same.

If I was on the NRL Commission, I would be encouraging the same with a 'flexible' or 'targeted' set of KPIs for each Club. The areas I would address would be i) average home crowds, ii) membership, iii) merchandise sales, iv) local juniors, v) sponsorship and vi) digital branding.

Taking the first condition for example, I would say Broncos you need an average crowd of 30k v 13k for Sea Eagles. Based on performance for the year for those conditions, the best performing clubs get a higher share of a pool called the "total club grant" of 13m x 16. The worst performing clubs get less (ideally much less than their salary cap).

The condition to each club will be bespoke - Broncos would have much higher targets than say Raiders.

Clubs that fail to continually grow the pie will need to propped up by private investment or will need to relocate / rebrand in an NRL funded expansion to new markets.

 

[Perth Red]

NRL clubs are lazy when it comes to revenue raising initiatives. Years of leagues club grants and now TV broadcasting revenue along with a generally inept Commission has meant much of the same.

If I was on the NRL Commission, I would be encouraging the same with a 'flexible' or 'targeted' set of KPIs for each Club. The areas I would address would be i) average home crowds, ii) membership, iii) merchandise sales, iv) local juniors, v) sponsorship and vi) digital branding.

Taking the first condition for example, I would say Broncos you need an average crowd of 30k v 13k for Sea Eagles. Based on performance for the year for those conditions, the best performing clubs get a higher share of a pool called the "total club grant" of 13m x 16. The worst performing clubs get less (ideally much less than their salary cap).

The condition to each club will be bespoke - Broncos would have much higher targets than say Raiders.

Clubs that fail to continually grow the pie will need to propped up by private investment or will need to relocate / rebrand in an NRL funded expansion to new markets.

time for that was when the clubs got a $4.5million a year grant increase. That horse has bolted. Nrl has clearly decided to leave them to their own devices and to sink or swim with no expectation of what they do to make themselves more viable and sustainable.

 

[colly]

Current crowded streaming market in Australia

Netflix
Disney+
Stan
Amazon Prime
Binge
Foxtel Now
Kayo (sports)
Apple TV
Youtube Premium
10 All Access
Hayu (reality TV)
Acorn TV (english TV)


on the horizon
DAZN (sports)
?HBO+ in 5 years

Netflix- Unlikely, as they have not done any deals sport in the US to this date.

Disney New entrant less than 6 mths old in Australia and 12 months US. Wonder how they would hold up NRL scandals - it will frighten the kiddies.
Binge
Foxtel Now
Kayo All three News/foxtel owned so unlikely to bid against themselves.

Stan Nine already have 3 games/online free. Not sure they know what to do- they should put it Stan Only or charge something as free on Nine Now.

Amazon prime maybe interested however possible, hookup by extra costs/subscription sports package.

Youtube premium. It's main/only selling point NO advertisers. For one of the biggest companies in the world (google) this is poor service.

All access CBS/Chanel Ten. If it were to happen SVOD it would be by some kind of new content like 2 new teams/extra game to sell.

If I was doing expansion I would have a second Brisbane Team which would necessitate a bye usually, however I would create a new comp based on GDP PER CAPTIA. Its a lower cost structure competition where all squad/team member are payed/contracted at the same amount and based on GPD Per Capita currently $51,663 dollars per player. The different comp's NRL and Australasian & Pacific comp can play one game ( the BYE team when you anther team to the NRL ) one game a week A semi pro comp to sell to Media/ Video On demand companies. Their is your Perth Pirates. Queensland Country, NSW Country and South Island NZ plus 2 ( Fiji, PNG ) $20 million tops to run new comp or equal to 2 new NRL teams. Once you add International games you got a decent product to sell.


https://globaledge.msu.edu/countries/australia/economy

Apple/Hayu Acorn- somehow I don't see them competing.

 

[taipan]

Comparing this to WW2? Really?

Unemployment was already over 5% pre covid and had anticipated to be over 8% in March this year regardless of Covid. When the last mega deal was done with tv Australias unemployment rate was 6.4% and tipped to go higher and it didnt seem to bother the TV companies then? If we hadnt had COVID and unemployment had continued to go up as predicted would the TV companies have demanded a reduction? Not likely!

I still dont believe that there was an $80 million "loan". there was a $100million advance, the two are quite different. The advance is being covered by annual reduced contract payments.

Whats lala land is to think that in 3-5 years time the world wont be largely back to normal and streaming service subscriptions wont be through the roof. Look at Kayo, in a short space of time it has more subscribers than Foxtel sports. The market is getting flodded as everyone wants a slice of the ballooning pie. We've handed Fox the streaming service content to beat off competitors for next 7 years, how much would they have paid for that opportunity in a year or two when DAZN, Disney (ESPN) etc are looking for market share sports leader content in Australia? It should have created a premium, instead we've sold it off cut price.

There will be a fTA contract from 2023, FTA isnt going away for a long while yet. It will undoubtedly be less but it will still be significant. Problem is we needed to generate media revenue in other ways to fill the gap but locking in Fox for such a long term has null and void any hope of that.

So they bloody well should retain the digital, there was absolutely no justification for handing it over. That's not a win, its a non negotiable!

You cant renegotiate the tv contract every time china gets the hump with us or Trump upsets Europe or Putin screws the oil price in case the tv companies struggle lol.

Well tell me how many businesses continued with strongwomen deals during WW2.
5% to a bare minimum 8% apparently is nothing.a 60% increase, and that his conservative.
When we had high unemployment of 6% ,we had none of what is going on now.

You are still treating COVID-19 with its huge Australian and World wide implications as being almost a hiccup and business just carries on.Wesfarmers is now chopping Target stores,ANZ Bank deferred dividends ,NAB cut theirs hugely,David Jones is chopping stores.Businesses closed ,such as pubs, clubs etc till the crap is over.The list goes on.

If there had been no COVID-19 ,we'd be playing with crowds in attendance sheesh, and retaining what money we had in the Bank, and 9 would have had to continue with the contract.Sponsors in some cases would not have pulled out with no play.
You can't simply use a fantasy hypothetical ,with all the crap around us.

And ch9s and Foxtel ad revenue wouldn't have dropped 30%,because businesses would be doing reasonably well.
What you believe is your guesstimate figure, differs to what has been mentioned by others in the media.I can't prove it and neither can you .All I know is we borrowed $30m initially during Todd's reign, the other $50m has never been spelt out.And should have been by Todd.

The question is if we had the availability of the alleged $130m on hand ,we would perhaps not have needed a $250m loan guarantee, could have been less.

Mate end of 2021 is not 3 years time.Because that's when FTA negotiations would have to be completed.
Well if you choose to go against what the RBA here and the world business people are stating, go ahead.Do you read where companies are shutting down branches and stores permanently. Where China has economic problems, they all affect us.


Retaining it is a win for commonsense especially as both media outlets complained about it eating into their profitable work, if we didn't have it you'd be claiming a loss.And going off your tree as I would.
Perhaps we could have got more in the Tv deals by offloading Digital, do you seriously want that.That is an ace up our sleeve.


FFS this is a once in 100 years worldwide catastrophe(it's not just health but economics) ,and you still can't wrap your head around the fact, and until you appreciate that fact you are living in another land.