Disney has pulled more than half of its TV box sets from Sky's streaming service, including popular series such as Grey's Anatomy, Scandal and the Marvel shows, as the entertainment giant prepares to launch its Netflix rival in the Republic and the UK next year.
The world's largest entertainment company, which owns crown jewels from the Star Wars and Marvel franchises to Toy Story-maker Pixar and family favourites such as Frozen 2, is building a content arsenal to make sure its new Disney+ venture is a hit when it launches in several countries in Europe including Ireland on March 31st .
The content clawback has already begun with the number of seasons of TV shows made by Disney-owned ABC available on the Sky Now streaming service slashed from 99 to 45 between April and October, according to research conducted by Ampere.
Disney's strategy, which will accelerate over the next 18 months as its Hollywood film and TV deals with Sky come up for renewal, threatens to break the pay-TV giant's decades-long stranglehold on top US content.
Disney+, which expanded its already immense content library by completing a €70 billion deal to buy 21st Century Fox earlier this year, is seeking to re-invent its business model for the streaming age by investing billions in making Disney+ the global home of most of its content.
Key partner
Disney’s content makes it a key partner for Sky. It accounted for almost 30 per cent of the premium movies aired on Sky’s main pay-TV service in the third quarter, according to Ampere.
Sky is an immensely profitable partner for Disney and it is expected that even if the US entertainment group does pull its prime movies and TV shows, it will continue to have a deal in place for its TV channels - such as Disney Junior and Disney XD – to continue to be broadcast to Sky’s 24 million pay-TV customers across Europe.
“Our customers love Disney content and we have a long standing relationship with Disney that we expect to continue,” said a spokeswoman for Sky in Ireland. – Guardian service
