Eye-balls are increasingly moving away from the conventional TVs to the web; that is a cold hard fact of the 21st century. A fact that is deeply hurting the pockets of conventional TVs. It is now emerging that the English Premier League could start streaming live on popular streaming platforms; Facebook and Amazon.
The Straits Times reports that during a quarterly call with bank executives in New York, the Manchester United Vice Chairman, Ed Woodward said tech companies are increasingly expressing their interest to live stream the English Premier League.
“We are hearing that around the Premier League table, and we are also hearing that from an European perspective in terms of interest in the Champions League and Europa league rights. I do think we are going to see an increasing engagement from these, and we would welcome the interest.”
Tech companies, Facebook and Amazon, are said to be currently bidding for rights to live stream the Premier League. Currently, Amazon streams the National Football League (NFL) on Thursday in the US, while Facebook has signed a deal to stream 22 Major League Soccer game and next season’s Champions League Football in the US.
Should there bid successfully pull through, Facebook and Amazon will join the lucrative cohort of English Premier League rights holders. A development that will excite many football fans who currently have to pay considerably high Pay-tv subscription plans from various competing outlets.
Amazon may tie the Premier League streaming to its Amazon Prime video platform while Facebook might stream it on the Facebook Watch platform.