ESPN and YouTube TV.
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Barely a month after striking a deal with NBCUniversal to avoid dropping its networks, YouTube TV is facing another potential outage – this time with Disney.
Disney announced Thursday that it will begin broadcasting public messages to YouTube TV subscribers alerting customers that the company’s networks, including ABC and ESPN, will be removed from the service if the two sides fail to reach a new carriage deal, which expires Oct. 30 at 11:59 p.m. ET.
“This is the latest example of Google exploiting its position to the detriment of its own customers,” a Disney spokesperson said in a statement. “If we don’t reach a fair deal soon, YouTube TV customers will lose access to ESPN and ABC, as well as all of our flagship programming, including NFL, college football, NBA and NHL seasons, and much more.”
Disney began airing public announcements on YouTube TV at 5 p.m. ET.
As with NBCUniversal, YouTube TV is seeking better rates for Disney programming, according to people familiar with the discussions. YouTube TV has about 10 million subscribers and wants more favorable terms given their scale, the sources said.
“We worked in good faith to negotiate an agreement with Disney that compensates them fairly for their content on YouTube TV,” a spokesperson for the service said in a statement. “Unfortunately, Disney is proposing costly economic terms that would increase prices for YouTube TV customers and give our customers fewer choices, while benefiting Disney’s own live TV products, like Hulu + Live TV and, soon, Fubo. Without a deal, we will have to remove Disney content from YouTube TV and if it remains unavailable for an extended period of time, we will offer subscribers a $20 credit $. “
YouTube TV and NBCUniversal first agreed to a temporary extension to avoid a blackout before signing a finalized deal days later.
Two years ago, Disney struck an unusual distribution deal with Charter, the largest U.S. pay-TV provider by subscribers, that allowed some Charter subscribers to access Disney+, Hulu and ESPN+ at no additional cost. Disney is willing to offer YouTube TV the same terms as that charter deal, two of the people said.
YouTube TV is once again asking to ingest Disney’s streaming content, giving customers the ability to view programming on Disney+, Hulu and ESPN+ without leaving the YouTube platform, according to a person familiar with the negotiations. YouTube TV also requested this during its negotiations with NBCUniversal and was rejected. Disney similarly has no plans to say yes to this request, according to people familiar with the company’s thinking.
The conflict between Disney and YouTube has an additional element of conflict. YouTube hired former Disney distribution chief Justin Connolly earlier this year, prompting Disney to file a breach of contract lawsuit. Connolly recused himself from those discussions, according to people familiar with the process.
Disclosure: Comcast is the parent company of NBCUniversal, which owns CNBC. Versant would become the new parent company of CNBC in Comcast’s planned spinoff of Versant.