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Sky Italia Complains To Watchdog Over DAZN-TIM Deal

By  |  June 27, 2021

Sky Italia has launched a formal antitrust challenge to the deal between DAZN and Telecom Italia (TIM).

DAZN secured a ‘historic’ rights deal with Italy’s Serie A earlier this year, with the sports streamer agreeing a distribution partnership with TIM. Reuters reports that TIM would cover more than 40% of the annual payments that DAZN will pay to Serie A. TIM CEO Luigi Gubitosi meanwhile said last month that the deal will mean that TIM is the only telco that can offer customers a subscription to DAZN.

Sky however has objected to this partnership and called it “illegitimate.” The Comcast-owned Sky has argued that the tie-up will serve to strengthen TIM’s dominant position in the market by preventing DAZN from agreeing deals with other operators. 

This follows a rejected bid from Sky Italia to host DAZN’s content on its platform for the next three years. That bid, reported on earlier this month, was said to be worth €1.5 billion – €1 billion shy of DAZN’s annual fee to Serie A.

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