Why Does Venu Sports Want to Self-Destruct in 9 Years?

Per a recent court filing, Venu Sports, the coming sports-centric streaming service from Fox , Disney , and Warner Bros. Discovery , is set to self-destruct in nine years. No one asked the joint-venture partners to set an expiration date on a service they have not yet even launched, and doing so is definitely not normal business practice, so why forfeit to the competition before you even enter the game? There appears to be two things going on here.

One is that Venu is currently trying to survive a call for an injunction by that other sports-centric streaming service, Fubo . The strategy: The Venu joint venture is not meant to bully Fubo into oblivion or to cannibalize cable customers, therefore there’s no antitrust violation. A Disney court filing from July 25, 2024, obtained by IndieWire, reads (in part, and emphasis ours): Venu is structured to maintain and protect competition among its members.

Each JV member will continue to negotiate individually with leagues to acquire sports rights; Venu will not acquire sports rights itself. Each member will continue individually to negotiate carriage agreements for its networks with Venu and other distributors; Venu will have no exclusive content, no say in how its members license their content to others, and no right to license its content to other MVPDs. A firewall prevents sharing of competitively sensitive information.

Venu is finite, with a nine-year term. Fubo points to no case where a joint venture with characteristics like .