Comments Thread For: What's Happening With DAZN? - Part One

[BIGPOPPAPUMP]

By Thomas Hauser - On May 10, 2018, Eddie Hearn (managing director of Matchroom Boxing) and Simon Denyer (CEO of what was then Perform Group) announced a joint venture at a press conference in New York. Former ESPN president John Skipper, who had joined Perform Group as its executive chairman three days earlier, was also in attendance...
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[Motorcity Cobra]

Skipper is smart. But he rarely dealt with boxing when he was at ESPN. And there's a long, steep, arduous learning curve when it comes to understanding the business of boxing.

And a familiar refrain heard from boxing insiders is, "The people who run DAZN are very naive when it comes to the business of boxing . . . DAZN needs an experienced boxing guy whose only loyalty is to DAZN . . . People who know next-to-nothing about boxing are making high-level deals for DAZN, and the numbers aren't adding up for them on any rational basis."

Hmmm I wonder who said that months ago.

https://www.boxingscene.com/forums/s...d.php?t=818995

The powers that be at DAZN were impressed by the spectacle of Anthony Joshua's conquest of Wladimir Klitschko in London on April 23, 2017. It fired their imagination. Thereafter, Hearn convinced them that, with DAZN's money and his expertise, they could duplicate this success and become a dominant force in boxing in the United States. Their interests were further unified by an agreement that gives DAZN what multiple sources say is a 40 percent equity interest in Matchroom USA (Hearn's American promotional company).

"We came in with a load of money and I expected loads of people to just sign for us," Hearn told British journalist Ron Lewis this past October. "It has been harder than I thought it would have been. ESPN and PBC have dug their heels in and we’ve had to overpay fighters to come to us or stay with us.”

Told you Eddie sold these people a dream that he was gonna sign all these PBC fighters if they gave him the money. HBO dropping boxing saved DAZN. They would probably be out of business by now if that hadn't happened. What was their plan if HBO hadn't gotten out of boxing? Their plan was to sign a lot of PBC fighters. That's it. No plan b.

[Motorcity Cobra]

Ten million for Chavez vs Jacobs and they owe Chavez Jr another seven figure payday

DAZN shouldn't have been stunned either. But a source says that it paid close to ten million dollars for the bout and might be locked into paying Chavez a seven-figure license fee for another fight.

[Motorcity Cobra]

But while DAZN has been a good deal for subscribers, it might not be a good deal for investors. Everyone understood going in that there would be red ink at the start. But not as much red ink as there has been. Revenue has been low and shows little sign of increasing to a viable level. DAZN's business model might be unsustainable.

More on that tomorrow.

Can't wait for that tomorrow. Especially the people who told me I was wrong when I said the half a billion dollars was to recoup Blatanavik's half a billion he'd already put into the company because he's cut off the personal funding.

[OctoberRed]

Can't wait for that tomorrow. Especially the people who told me I was wrong when I said the half a billion dollars was to recoup Blatanavik's half a billion he'd already put into the company because he's cut off the personal funding.

What I found interesting was the bit in there, that DAZN owns 40% of Matchroom USA. I never knew that.

[Motorcity Cobra]

What I found interesting was the bit in there, that DAZN owns 40% of Matchroom USA. I never knew that.

Yea and Hearn has shares in DAZN. All these guys stand to make hundreds of millions if they can sell DAZN off. This is a pump and dump. But they need a certain number of static subscribers. The churn is killing them. That's why Hearn talks about raising the price to $50 a month to get people locked into a yearly subscription.

[alexjust]

Didn't really read the article...who's got time? If they don't do very well its because of a horrible, intuitively unpronounceable name.

[bigsmoothh]

i remember when dazn on youtube had less than 90k subscribers a few months ago. now they are at like 500k+

[OctoberRed]

i remember when dazn on youtube had less than 90k subscribers a few months ago. now they are at like 500k+

That's because they have highlights of their fights on there pretty quickly after they happen, and sometimes the entire fight.

Not a good strategy for the long run, because I know people who don't pay and just catch the aftermath on their Youtube.

That's why WWE started cutting back on their Youtube post-event content, as too many people were dropping from subbing for the WWE Network and just watching free highlights on social media. And a strange fact is India is the top country among the WWE's huge social media numbers. Who knows what the top country is for DAZN? UK I would reckon, since they don't have DAZN there.

[Robbie Barrett]

They went from 4 mil subs to 8 mil subs in 6 months. They're on the right track.