Nine adds sport to Stan’s streaming slate

Nine is expanding its subscription service Stan to include sport for the first time, kicking off with rugby.

Rieko Ioane scores try during the 2020 Tri-Nations match between the Wallabies and All Blacks at Suncorp Stadium. Picture: Getty Images

Amid increasing streaming competition, Nine is expanding its subscription service Stan to include sport for the first time, starting with rugby union matches next year.

The media company, born out of a $4bn merger with Fairfax Media nearly two years ago, announced on Monday that it will launch Stan Sport, which will be offered as a bundle to Stan’s customers.

The announcement comes on the heels of a new $100m three-year deal with Rugby Australia to broadcast rugby matches on Nine’s free-to-air television network and Stan, subject to the sports governing body SANZAAR giving the green light. Nine also has an option to extend the rugby deal by a further two years.

Nine chief executive Hugh Marks said the creation of Stan Sport was a “bold expansion” for Stan boss Mike Sneesby and his team.

“We will bring all our collective expertise from decades of experience in live sport broadcasting to deliver the best possible outcomes for viewers, rights holders, and the growth ambitions of the sports we partner with,“ Mr Marks said in a statement.

The broadcast deal, includes Super Rugby, Super W, The Rugby Championship, including the Bledisloe Cup, Wallaroos games, Shute Shield, Hospital Cup, Mitre 10 & Currie Cup, plus SANZAAR Union home games.

The move into sport comes as Stan, which competes against Netflix, Foxtel, Binge and Hayu, prepares to lose the bulk of its key Showtime television programs from January.

Stan, which had 2.2m active subscribers in August, is expected to lose about 500 hours of library content, including shows such as Californication, Happyish, Nurse Jackie and Dexter. It also won’t get any new Showtime programs. However, its current Showtime deal means it will continue to get new episodes of existing shows on its platform, such as Billions, for the entire run of the show.

Stan’s rugby deal, which was widely expected, draws the end to Foxtel’s 25-year partnership with Rugby Australia following a difficult year. It’s unclear what other big sport codes could be shown on Stan Sport next year, as the Australian broadcast rights to the NRL, AFL, cricket, Supercars and the English Premier League have already been locked-in by others.

Foxtel CEO Patrick Delany said rugby’s popularity has waned over the past five years, due to on and off field antics, and the offering is vastly different now.

“While the Wallabies have always been non-exclusive to Fox Sports with every game on free TV as well, the new Super Rugby competition is very different with fewer games overall and fewer games involving Australian teams,” Mr Delany said.

“While we would have preferred to retain rugby, we said earlier this year that we would maintain discipline in relation to sports rights – and we have.”

Audiences for the four game Bledisloe matches on commercial TV broadcaster Network Ten averaged 316,000 viewers, down 13 per cent on last year’s two-match series. Streaming numbers on its 10Play platform added another 10,000 to its rugby audience this year.

Average audiences for Super Rugby on Fox dropped by 35 per cent between 2014 to 2019. It peaked in 2011 with an average audience of more than 500,000 on Fox Sports watching the Super Rugby Final. That compared to 110,000 this year, despite two Australian teams in the tournament.

Foxtel’s subscription streaming service Kayo last month announced it would broadcast some sports, starting with Supercars races, outside its paywall from early next year.

Kayo, which was launched by Foxtel two years ago, is looking to reach more viewers and advertisers through the move.