Comcast Said to Gain Rights to Offer Web TV Service Nationwide – Bloomberg (Mar 23, 2017)
I’ve held for quite a while that there’s a game of chicken going on between the various big pay TV providers over who will be first to take a streaming version of their service nationwide, and it looks like Comcast is taking steps to ensure that it can do so if and when it decides to move forward. That’s not a guarantee that Comcast actually will do so, and indeed this piece suggests Comcast has no immediate plans on this front. But it’s clearly in a very strong position to do so, as the second largest TV provider in the US and the largest cable company, and also the pay TV provider with the strongest user interface through its X1 platform. That platform could potentially run as an app on third party boxes like Roku, Amazon Fire TV, and Apple TV should it choose to run a nationwide service. And there is, of course, big upside from a revenue perspective in offering its service nationally, especially as a hedge against cord cutting within its existing footprint. The downside is that such a service would be standalone, and with content costs rising as a percentage of video revenue, margins there are being squeezed. In its footprint, Comcast can offset that by charging more for broadband or up-selling voice or home automation services as part of a bundle, but that’s not possible when selling online TV as a standalone product. Still, at some point I believe Comcast and other big pay TV providers will finally take really compelling TV offerings (rather than the watered down stuff we’re seeing from Sling and DirecTV) national, and that will be a big deal.
via Bloomberg
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