Dish Chairman Charlie Ergen Says Streaming Boom Benefits Pay-TV Distributors – Deadline
At another point during the call, Ergen said the company saved a considerable amount of money by not agreeing to higher contract terms with programmers like Sinclair and HBO. The decision, he said, resulted from internal analytics and also an instinct about where the TV bundle is heading. “As things go to streaming, we’re going to an à la carte world,” he said. As certain programming is shuffled from authenticated TV streaming apps to subscription services like Disney+, “that doesn’t increase their value to us,” Ergen said. “Obviously, that has to be taken into consideration in negotiations.”
As far as HBO, he said, “Our customers get HBO a different way today. They don’t have to get it from us. They can pirate it. They can use code sharing. They can get it through another distributor or from Amazon. Our customers will be able to get regional sports and local channels from Sinclair. They’re just going to get it a different way.”
Sports, long thought to be the linchpin of the traditional bundle, is also being rethought, Ergen said. “I would imagine even teams themselves will stream directly,” he predicted.
At another point during the call, Ergen said the company saved a considerable amount of money by not agreeing to higher contract terms with programmers like Sinclair and HBO. The decision, he said, resulted from internal analytics and also an instinct about where the TV bundle is heading. “As things go to streaming, we’re going to an à la carte world,” he said. As certain programming is shuffled from authenticated TV streaming apps to subscription services like Disney+, “that doesn’t increase their value to us,” Ergen said. “Obviously, that has to be taken into consideration in negotiations.”
As far as HBO, he said, “Our customers get HBO a different way today. They don’t have to get it from us. They can pirate it. They can use code sharing. They can get it through another distributor or from Amazon. Our customers will be able to get regional sports and local channels from Sinclair. They’re just going to get it a different way.”
Sports, long thought to be the linchpin of the traditional bundle, is also being rethought, Ergen said. “I would imagine even teams themselves will stream directly,” he predicted.
