The War between Disney and DirecTV has come to an End

Roderick Coleman
Sep 17, 2024
2 min read

DirecTV and Disney shaking hand — DIRECTV & DISNEY

Sports fans rejoice as the DirecTV "Blackout" comes to an end.

On Saturday morning, it was announced by both parties that they have reached a preliminary agreement, leading to the restoration of Disney channels (such as ESPN networks, ABC affiliates that are owned and operated, and streaming rights for other ABC affiliates) on DirecTV, UVerse, and DirecTV Stream. This was even mentioned by Pat McAfee on Saturday morning's College GameDay.

The language:

DIRECTV and The Walt Disney Company today announced an agreement in principle that provides greater choice, value, and flexibility to their mutual customers. As a result, Disney’s full linear suite of networks has been restored to DIRECTV, DIRECTV STREAM and U-verse customers while both parties work to finalize a new, multi-year contract.

Among the core points agreed to are:

• Continued carriage at market-based terms of Disney’s entertainment, sports and news programming from its comprehensive linear portfolio, which includes the ABC Owned Television Stations, the ESPN networks, the Disney-branded channels, Freeform, the FX networks and the National Geographic channels.

• The opportunity to offer multiple genre-specific options — sports, entertainment, kids & family — inclusive of Disney’s linear networks along with Disney+, Hulu and ESPN+.

• Disney’s direct-to-consumer streaming services (Disney+, Hulu, ESPN+) to be included in select DIRECTV packages under a wholesale agreement, and also to be made available on an a la carte basis.

• The rights to distribute Disney’s upcoming ESPN flagship direct-to-consumer service upon its launch at no additional cost to DIRECTV customers.

In a joint statement, the two companies commented: “Through this first-of-its-kind collaboration, DIRECTV and Disney are giving customers the ability to tailor their video experience through more flexible options. DIRECTV and Disney have a long-standing history of connecting consumers to the best entertainment, and this agreement furthers that commitment by recognizing both the tremendous value of Disney’s content and the evolving preferences of DIRECTV’s customers. We’d like to thank all affected viewers for their patience and are pleased to restore Disney’s entire portfolio of networks in time for college football and the Emmy Awards this weekend.”

What benefits do Disney and DirecTV gain from this?

For Disney, the answer is money. Neither company revealed what the financial terms of the new deal were, but it is unlikely that Disney would have signed on again if the new financial terms weren’t sufficiently valuing its products.

This could get DTV closer to something like Venu, (DirecTV sports streaming service) which was extremely attractive for consumers as a way to pick up the ESPN, Fox, and WBD cable networks (Fox and WBD were not available at all during the blackout, and ESPN only available through Max but likely to soon cost more there).