Disney is exploring strategic options for its Star India business, including a joint venture or a sale, according to The Wall Street Journal.
What’s Happening:
- Disney acquired Star India as part of its acquisition of 20th Century Fox in 2019.
- At the time, Star India was considered one of Fox’s crown jewels, and it was an important part of Disney’s plan to build out its streaming business globally.
- The company has talked to at least one bank about ways to help the India business grow, while sharing some of the costs. The talks are in the early stages and it is unclear which options, if any, Disney might pursue.
- The deal gave Disney the broadcast and streaming rights for increasingly popular Indian Premier League cricket matches as well as dozens of TV channels in several languages and a stake in a production company that makes Bollywood movies.
- Star’s Hotstar mobile-first streaming service, which at the time offered most of its content free, had 150 million monthly active users and was growing rapidly, largely because of the popular cricket rights.
- Following the loss of a bidding war over rights to the aforementioned cricket matches, Hotstar is expected to lose 8 million to 10 million subscribers in its fiscal third quarter.
- At the time, Disney agreed to pay $3 billion to retain the rights to broadcast the IPL on its Star India television network through 2027.