ON SHUTTING DOWN ESPN'S MVNO

ONE DOWN...

Well, Disney's ESPN division was the first to answer the question I posed in a post this past July titled "On too early to shut down MVNO's?"  As the Wall Street Journal reports:

"ESPN, a unit of Walt Disney Co., plans to pull the plug on its sports-themed mobile-telephone venture later this year but hopes to expand its wireless presence by licensing its Mobile ESPN application to other providers.

The New York sports-entertainment company confirmed Thursday that it will immediately suspend sales of new handsets for the Mobile ESPN service it launched less than a year ago. The company has developed cellphones that feature a variety of sports-centric content and features. But it has struggled to build a customer base in a fiercely competitive cellular industry with much bigger players.

Mobile ESPN operates through an agreement with Sprint Nextel Corp., paying for wholesale access to the carrier's network and then reselling service to its own subscribers."

What's ESPN planning for next steps?  They plan two courses of action:

"ESPN said it will continue licensing sports-related content to other wireless providers. The company also said it is currently in discussions with other carriers about licensing its Mobile ESPN application."

One can see the first course of action as having some merit.  The second one though seems a tad optimistic.

The Journal article offers this overall judgment of the venture:

"Even as it addressed initial launch problems, the company couldn't address a fundamental flaw in its model -- that consumers didn't want to buy an ESPN-branded cellphone to get access to ESPN content."

Ain't hindsight grand?

Comments

[Amit Doshi]

I think the idea of a ESPN Mobile Application on a smartphone that can stream video or what have you is a fantastic idea. I live in India now, but even if I was in the US, I dont know if Id go for an ESPN Cell phone, but I wouldnt mind the idea of buying or paying a sub for an ESPN app. Actually living in India now, Id love to be able to get a good ESPN app, that can play me highlights on my phone....all those hours in bombay traffic, can be put to good use :).