LOS ANGELES—Venu Sports, the upcoming standalone streaming service backed by Disney, Fox and Warner Bros. Discovery, has announced that it will launch at $42.99 a month, with a seven day free trial. The service has yet to unveil an exact launch date, though the joint venture is hoping to launch it before the start of the NFL season.
The hefty price tag for the service reflects the fact that its backers are targeting sports fans outside the traditional pay TV bundle and are hoping that it will not compete with or interfere with their ability to continue to extract hefty carriage fees from pay TV operations. Some research has cast doubt on that strategy, prompting some analysts to claim it may in fact accelerate cord cutting.
