Tycoon's ‘Netflix of Sports' stumbles in bid for UK Premier League and Champions League
BT Group Plc had been trying to find a buyer or partner for its pay-TV unit BT Sport for at least 10 months, with rivals including DAZN, Walt Disney Co., Amazon.com Inc. and Discovery Inc. all sizing up potential offers. For much of the bidding process, billionaire Len c’s streaming service DAZN, known as the “Netflix of Sports”, was widely reported as the likely winner.
Such was the confidence within the DAZN camp, one executive was even spotted playing Township, a farming simulation game, on his smartphone during a meeting with BT at Goldman Sachs Group Inc., according to people familiar with the matter, who asked not to be named because the discussions were private.
In the end, BT lost confidence in DAZN’s bid, the people said. After a bout of last minute negotiations, BT revealed on Thursday that it would pursue a joint venture with a rival bidder, U.S. entertainment group Discovery, which would combine it with Eurosport UK.
Representatives for BT and DAZN declined to comment.
Success would have won DAZN rights to the U.K. Premier League and Champions League soccer, crown jewels that would have granted a splashy entrance to the region’s biggest live sport broadcast market. It recently won major sports rights deals in Germany, Italy and Spain.
Deliberations continued until late on Wednesday, the people familiar with the matter said. DAZN even raised its bid in the final stages of negotiations in an effort to save the deal, they said.
Ultimately BT’s Chairman Adam Crozier, Chief Executive Officer Philip Jansen and consumer division chief Marc Allera opted for the longer-term value presented by Discovery’s proposals.
Mike Darcey, a former COO at Sky, said an important factor in any decision would have been the level of
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