Venu Sports, the sports streaming app announced by Fox, Disney, and Warner Bros. Discovery (WBD) in February as part of a joint venture, will no longer be launched, the companies said today.
The app was meant to offer subscribers access to all three companies’ channels that show sports, such as ABC, Fox, ESPN, FS1, and TruTV. It was not expected to have original content at the start, but the service was supposed to cover around 85 percent of the sports rights market in the US. The app was planned to cost $43 per month.
In a joint statement released today, the companies said:
“After careful consideration, we have collectively agreed to discontinue the Venu Sports joint venture (JV) and not launch the streaming service. In an ever-changing marketplace, we determined that it was best to meet the evolving demands of sports fans by focusing on existing products and distribution channels.
We are proud of the work that has been done on Venu to date and grateful to the Venu staff, whom we will support through this transition period.”
The decision follows concerns from competitors, sports rights holders, and other critics who worried that the JV would become too powerful and might violate antitrust laws.
Shortly after the February announcement, Fubo, a sports streaming service, filed an antitrust lawsuit against the venture. Fubo argued that the companies behind Venu were forcing price increases by bundling unwanted content with popular sports channels. Fubo was granted a temporary injunction against Venu’s launch before a trial that was supposed to happen in October 2025.
But on Monday, Fubo announced that its lawsuit against the three companies had been settled. Fubo is merging with Disney’s Hulu + Live TV service. Under the deal, Disney will own 70 percent of Fubo, and Fubo will receive $220 million in cash from Disney, Fox, and WBD when the deal is finalized.
The Hollywood Reporter mentioned that this deal is expected to take 12 to 18 months to close. Disney and Fubo have not made any changes to their merger plans following today’s announcement.
While Fubo’s lawsuit seems to be resolved, other competitors in the sports TV industry are still challenging the Venu venture.
In a letter to US District Judge Margaret M. Garnett of the Southern District of New York, Michael Hartman, general counsel and chief external affairs officer for DirectTV, wrote that Fubo’s settlement “does nothing to resolve the underlying antitrust violations at issue.” Hartman asked the court to keep the preliminary injunction against the app’s launch.
“The preliminary injunction has protected consumers and distributors alike from the JV Defendant’s scheme to ‘capture demand,’ ‘suppress’ potentially competitive sports bundles, and impose consumer price hikes,” the letter said, adding that DirectTV would continue to explore its options regarding the JV “and other anticompetitive harms.”
Similarly, Pantelis Michalopoulos, lawyer for EchoStar Corporation, which owns Dish, wrote a letter to Garnett on January 7, claiming the members of the JV “purchased their way out of their antitrust violation.” Michalopoulos said the JV companies should not be allowed to pay to erase the court’s decision that temporarily blocked Venu’s launch.
Besides Fubo, DirecTV, and Dish, ACA Connects (a trade association for small- and medium-sized telecom service providers) also raised concerns about Venu. The NFL was also reportedly worried about the potential effects of the venture.
Now, the three companies behind Venu have decided to cancel the app, which could have attracted many subscribers looking for an easier way to watch all their sports content without jumping between apps and subscriptions. But by canceling it, they avoid further lawsuits and negative reactions.
