Soccer Broadcasting Business
The rights for broadcasting of UEFA matches for 2009-2012 have been successfully acquired by Singtel. As a staunch supporter for Starhub Cable TV, I feel very indignant about it. We look at how the cable television industry works here, in this small but affluent little red dot.
Half the people who sign up for cable television here are sports loving community. Others are looking for substitutes against local satellite networks, or wish to look at the world more holistically. Among the sports loving people, I dare say, at least 70% of them watch soccer, particularly English, Spanish, Italian soccer (generally European matches). Amongst them, Barclays Premier League (BPL) and Champions League are the perennial favorites. (Let’s try to omit the once-every-four-years affairs out in this discussion.)
Looking at the start of the 2007-2008 soccer season, where we see three contenders for the rights for BPL matches.
Singtel is the upcoming contender against Starhub’s monopoly in the cable industry. These 2 companies have a long record of competing in the telecommunications industry, but are new in this battleground. But looking at the Singtel’s financial backings, it seems that they are serious and would not go down easily against Starhub.
ESPN StarSports has been broadcasting BPL soccer matches (and its previous incarnations) ever since free local satellite networks stop providing them due to cost effective reasons. Though not a cable television provider here, they have 2 channels at Starhub.
Starhub Cable has been providing soccer from most other popular leagues and of course, the UEFA and FIFA World Cup matches since the near disintegration of TV12. Looking at the popularity of BPL here, Starhub hopes to poke its finger into this lucrative pie and eventually won the bid. At a cost of 250 million, it would be four times the bid for the previous season. To offset this humongous cost, the subscribers are the eventual sufferers as Starhub increased the subscription cost for the sports channels to 25 bucks, up from 15 bucks. (Sounds like using our money to pay for this incredulous bid.)
In my opinion, I think that Starhub should let ESPN StarSports win the bid or to go for a combined bid for this season's BPL, rather than having a lose-lose situation for both companies and local viewers. Given that ESPN channels are on Starhub, it would have been a might-as-well situation and gather forces against Singtel.
To the people who continued to put up with this shock due to Starhub’s monopoly in this industry, we hope that Starhub would provide better service. However, losing the rights to Singtel is an utter disappointment. Totally unacceptable! Not only that Starhub has been losing customers at its initial price hike, this loss would bring irrevocable damage to its image as the industry leader. Who should we look to now for future matches? It would be terrible if we have to subscribe Mio to watch Champions League and Starhub Cable to watch BPL. And that is if ESPN StarSports or Starhub manage to secure BPL rights for the following years. Worse, ESPN StarSports might put up its channels at Mio in future instead, Starhub supporters would have gotten double blow.
Felt like crap and being severely played out.
-异客拍客-
Half the people who sign up for cable television here are sports loving community. Others are looking for substitutes against local satellite networks, or wish to look at the world more holistically. Among the sports loving people, I dare say, at least 70% of them watch soccer, particularly English, Spanish, Italian soccer (generally European matches). Amongst them, Barclays Premier League (BPL) and Champions League are the perennial favorites. (Let’s try to omit the once-every-four-years affairs out in this discussion.)
Looking at the start of the 2007-2008 soccer season, where we see three contenders for the rights for BPL matches.
Singtel is the upcoming contender against Starhub’s monopoly in the cable industry. These 2 companies have a long record of competing in the telecommunications industry, but are new in this battleground. But looking at the Singtel’s financial backings, it seems that they are serious and would not go down easily against Starhub.
ESPN StarSports has been broadcasting BPL soccer matches (and its previous incarnations) ever since free local satellite networks stop providing them due to cost effective reasons. Though not a cable television provider here, they have 2 channels at Starhub.
Starhub Cable has been providing soccer from most other popular leagues and of course, the UEFA and FIFA World Cup matches since the near disintegration of TV12. Looking at the popularity of BPL here, Starhub hopes to poke its finger into this lucrative pie and eventually won the bid. At a cost of 250 million, it would be four times the bid for the previous season. To offset this humongous cost, the subscribers are the eventual sufferers as Starhub increased the subscription cost for the sports channels to 25 bucks, up from 15 bucks. (Sounds like using our money to pay for this incredulous bid.)
In my opinion, I think that Starhub should let ESPN StarSports win the bid or to go for a combined bid for this season's BPL, rather than having a lose-lose situation for both companies and local viewers. Given that ESPN channels are on Starhub, it would have been a might-as-well situation and gather forces against Singtel.
To the people who continued to put up with this shock due to Starhub’s monopoly in this industry, we hope that Starhub would provide better service. However, losing the rights to Singtel is an utter disappointment. Totally unacceptable! Not only that Starhub has been losing customers at its initial price hike, this loss would bring irrevocable damage to its image as the industry leader. Who should we look to now for future matches? It would be terrible if we have to subscribe Mio to watch Champions League and Starhub Cable to watch BPL. And that is if ESPN StarSports or Starhub manage to secure BPL rights for the following years. Worse, ESPN StarSports might put up its channels at Mio in future instead, Starhub supporters would have gotten double blow.
Felt like crap and being severely played out.
-异客拍客-
posted by fukepaike at 11:43 PM
2 Comments:
I was not too please with starhub losing this battle too...
Well, I guess in this world, whoever has more money wins. Who knows, in the future, singtel may acquire the rights to broadcast both BPL and UEFA champions league.
I wonder what kind of damage would be done to starhub... and the inconvenience of subscribers to switch the cable tv provider.
-dakepaike-
yar lor... damn tulanz.
btw got a bit of edit in this post.
-异客拍客-
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