Separating the NFL from its movies and TV shows
Amazon’s Prime Video may focus primarily on movies and TV shows, but sports content has become a more significant part of the streaming service over the past couple of years. It seems the company may be taking it more seriously than ever now with a new report suggesting the company is in the early stages of developing a stand-alone sports app for Prime content.
Sources known to The Information (via XDA) shared details that say the company is considering a separate app for sports content. According to the sources, there’s no firm plan in place yet, but it may decide to put its football, baseball, and soccer games in a separate place. Amazon has a variety of apps to access its services such as shopping or its Kindle service, but so far all of its streaming content has been available through the Prime Video app on smart TVs, streaming sticks, mobile phones, and more.
The leak doesn’t share much more information, and it sounds like this plan is still in the very early stages. The report even says that Amazon may decide to shelve this plan after all, so there’s no certainty this will ever see the light of day. It’s unclear if this move would be part of the service separating its sporting services entirely into a new streaming service with a package dedicated to sports, or whether it’d be for those who want to watch games separately from the main app.
If Amazon does decide to do this, it may mean we see even more sports included on Prime. Last month, Amazon CEO Andy Jassy highlighted sports as an area Amazon will continue to invest in. He called it “a unique asset”, so it may be we see other sports arrive on Amazon’s streaming service. That said, streaming sports is an expensive and competitive business.
YouTube announced last week that it has purchased the rights for NFL Sunday Ticket streaming, which was rumored to be around $2 billion each season. Earlier in 2022, Apple secured rights to both Major League Soccer and Major League Baseball. If Amazon wants to bolster its sports credentials, it will be a major investment.
