The Premier League has finally decided to cut out the middle man by launching its own direct-to-consumer streaming channel in Singapore — a move that may signal the end of a decades-old broadcasting model.
Dubbed ‘Premflix’ when it was first mooted in 2020, Premier League + is a six-year joint venture with existing league partner StarHub and will start operating in the Southeast Asian island state from the start of next season.
Speaking at the Financial Times’ Business of Football Summit in London on Thursday, Premier League chief executive Richard Masters said: “We’re going direct to consumer in partnership with StarHub, who have a lot of existing customers.
“It will be a new app that you can download on your smart TV or laptop. You’ll be able to watch 380 games a season, with lots of shoulder content and a 24/7 dedicated channel.
“Will it be replicable elsewhere? That’s what we’re going to find out.”
With subscription fees for traditional pay-TV outlets rising (and the number of different subscriptions fans need also increasing), supporters have been calling on the Premier League to take this step for years.
Why now?
The rationale is that by going direct-to-consumer, the league will be able to charge less than a third-party company does but still make more money by significantly increasing the paying audience.
But the league has been reluctant to take this step until now because the traditional model of selling media rights to broadcasters, on a market-by-market basis, has been incredibly lucrative. It has also meant the league has been able to outsource marketing costs to its broadcast partners, who have also handled everything from billing customers to dealing with complaints.
Those responsibilities in Singapore will now be shared by the league and StarHub. If the benefits outweigh the costs, it is almost inevitable that the league will offer Premier League + more widely.
It has already taken the first step to making this happen by bringing its international media content operation in-house. Starting from next season, the league’s international content will be produced at a new, state-of-the-art facility at Olympia in west London, ending a 20-year relationship with global agency IMG.
“If any league can experiment in this way, it’s the Premier League,” said Aston Villa’s president of business operations Francesco Calvo, who was also speaking at the FT summit.
“I like what we’re trying in Singapore — we’re going to learn lots,” added Newcastle United chief executive David Hopkinson.
The Premier League, of course, is not the first major European football league to take this step, as France’s Ligue 1 was forced to launch Ligue 1+ this season after years of broken deals and short-term fixes with pay-TV operators. While its launch has been more successful than many predicted, French clubs have seen their media revenues collapse over the last decade.
The English league, however, can experiment from a position of strength and is under no real pressure to go fully direct-to-consumer any time soon.