Looks to me that the VM strategy is to hold out for better deals from the streamers because they think the the streamers will eventually need them, so won't be offering any more anytime soon (it was said that the Disney+ negotiations failed because VM wanted a bigger cut of the subscription money).
Whilst VM are playing their usual waiting game in the hope of a more financially advantageous deal (as we have seen do for years with linear channels) the Sky strategy seems to be to embrace the streamers as all the most popular ones are already on there.
A dangerous gamble to take whilst linear channels continue to be pulled and VM customers gradually lose access to content with no reduction in subscriptions (in fact quite the opposite).
You don't, as a company, bow to the other party's demands quickly in all circumstances. Eventually that's how you go out of business. Sky needed to fill the loss promptly for their Sky Cinema business and needed to make an earlier deal to keep them in the "film fan consideration equation", having the app as part of the billing makes it easier to retain those customers rather than having get used to bypassing them. And from Disney's perspective they know they still need access to the biggest UK Pay TV provider (by far), at least initially. Disney don't really need to deal with another Pay TV provider in the UK, VM isn't big enough (in TV) for Disney to be that bothered, they come from a greater position of strength to the negotiation table. VM will know this and likely don't want to be taken advantage of. They assign a value too and it won't be worth it if the other party is taking the P. Bit like UHD is deemed worth being part of their Sky deals but Atlantic still isn't deemed worth the price tag. VM will know how valuable a large service is to it based on how their deal with Netflix has worked for them. That will shape what they think is need to make a Disney deal worth doing. Doing a deal with Disney, any deal, just because they are Disney isn't a sustainable way to run a business. And we all know TV isn't VM's priority business. Maybe this new TV product being trialled with broadband customers is the problem? To make it a viable product VM need a certain cut? The only thing I want Disney to do is launch physical gift cards to pay for Plus, I don't give a scooby if it's via my VM box. It's convenient, but that's it. |