Apple, Amazon look to acquire Big Ten streaming rights

Yahoo Finance's Josh Schafer breaks down reports that streaming giants are bidding over Big Ten media rights.

Video transcript

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BRIAN CHEUNG: College sports, the latest target in the streaming wars battle. Let's bring in Yahoo Finance's Josh Shafer with the details on the Big Ten maybe getting involved with Apple TV. What's the latest?

JOSH SHAFER: Yeah, Brian, there's a lot going on here, to be honest, with the Big Ten because they kind of split up their media rights. So they're gonna be doing traditional broadcast and streaming. So it looks like, based on multiple reports, that the traditional broadcast rights are gonna go to FOX, who we already knew FOX already had rights there. And then CBS and NBC. NBC might include a little bit of a Peacock angle toward that, but that's not gonna be the pure streaming play.

The pure streaming competitors are Apple and Amazon. The two big tech giants that we want to get more into sports. We had an analyst yesterday tell us that they could cannibalize the whole streaming industry if they want, simply based on how much cash on hand they have. So it seems like Apple and Amazon are both interested here.

Now, notice what name have I not mentioned that's always involved in sports? ESPN and Disney, right? It seems like ESPN had an offer-- according to "Sports Business Journal," ESPN had an offer on the table or was offered from the Big Ten, they said, give us $380 million for seven years which is significantly more than they paid for the SEC, and Disney walked away.

And so that, to me, is interesting because I think we're starting to see Disney make choices on what they want. They don't just want to be everything when it comes to sports.

BRIAN CHEUNG: At any place.

JOSH SHAFER: Because they have the SEC, which is the other big conference. But now, it seems like they're starting to make some choices where we can't just spend everywhere and just get every single sports streaming rights.

AKIKO FUJITA: Well, I mean, in the meantime, Amazon and Apple sort of quietly building up their arsenal. I mean, maybe not so quietly. We've been talking about it.