Sony Pixel Power calrec Sony

FAST Channels Part Two: Why They Matter for Sports Entities

05/12/2023

FAST Channels Part Two: Why They Matter for Sports Entities Samsung, ATP Media, and Telstra Broadcast Services On Why FAST Should Be Part of Your Content Strategy By SVG Staff

Tuesday, December 5, 2023 - 11:50 am

Print This Story | Subscribe

Story Highlights

Below is part two of our report on the rise of FAST (free ad-supported streaming). It has been undeniable in the past two years, and the transcript below dives into everything from how to launch a FAST channel, what makes for a successful one, and how it can help sports entities, both big and small, expand their reach and business. It is based on a panel discussion at Sportel Monaco that was moderated by SVG Co-Executive Director Ken Kerschbaumer, featured three key entities either involved in or seriously investigating a FAST sports service: Samsung (represented by Chris Gregory, strategic content partner, lead, Samsung TV Plus); Telstra Broadcast Services (Anna Lockwood, head of EMEA/Americas, Telstra Broadcast Services); and ATP Media (Alan Bruno, head of broadcast development, ATP Media). Click here to read Part 1.

FAST panel at Sportel: (from left) ATP Media's Alan Bruno, Samsung's Chris Gregory, Telstra Broadcast Services' Anna Lockwood, and moderator SVG's Ken Kerschbaumer

Launching a FAST service with live sports can require some controls around where it is seen, and also which sponsors are seen. Chris, can you discuss how Samsung TV handles those situations?

Gregory: FIFA Plus is a great example where we launched it in 20 countries out of our 24. If any rights holder comes to us, we do put blocks in and we appreciate that sponsors have multimillion billion dollar deals, so we'll block out any competitors. My Samsung ads team aren't always happy with that, but they understand that potentially the deals that are done at this kind of level are at this point much higher than FAST. So, we would block any competitor ads and we'd actually get introductions to the major sponsors for them so they can get their campaigns to viewers at the most relevant time and tournaments.

What do we see as the opportunity for smaller organizations and how do they get involved?

Gregory: For the smaller federations it's a great opportunity for distribution because they might not have a broadcast relationship in all of the countries, we have our service in. What we are looking for are FAST channels that resonate with a local viewer. For example, field hockey would probably work a lot better in the Netherlands as opposed to Germany. So, we review the channel, and we have managers in each country who will say, This will work, this won't work. So, for smaller federations we do more local-level deals.

Bruno: The in-between is a larger federation with perhaps smaller level tournaments that maybe don't have a TV or broadcast home. FAST could be an interesting solution for that as well.

Lockwood: And everyone has dark markets. There are a lot of conversations around where there is a rights gap, where there is a market that's dark, and where there are fans that are underserved. I think there's a big play in FAST for everyone from tier one down to niche sports or emerging sports.

Let's dive into what makes for a good FAST channel. How much content should they look to have on a weekly basis for example? How much do you have to refresh? What's that challenge?

Gregory: When I started at Samsung TV Plus four years ago, we were asking for 50 hours and 10% refresh a month. Now we're looking at 150 to 200 hours from launch plus a 25% refresh because the viewers get more sophisticated. Once they haven't got the number of hours their channel starts underperforming and that's when they start losing viewership and they start losing monetization as well. The ones with the higher hours and the higher refresh are the partners we really want on the platform.

Can you also do day parts? This feels very much like the cable landscape where at 3:00 AM the quality drops down a little bit. But if a channel's distributed globally, how do you lean into that so that dayparts line up with time zone?

Gregory: We have a compliance team that looks into all of that. Luckily that's not my job, but we try and get all partners to schedule their channels accordingly with day parts. With movie channels, for example, in the UK all 15-and-up rated films are scheduled after 9 pm. We know from the data that we see that the people who are watching are normally kids early in the morning, late at night just before they go to bed, and then the parents after that as well. We try and create a very family friendly environment because we know that it's a family environment that TV Plus is being watched by.

Lockwood: And that's also something that for us is interesting because we get asked a lot more about normalization, localization, compliance, regulations. When we first started this, those conversations were not that common but now, with the changing regulatory landscape, that's become much more critical.

Chris, what about exclusivity, having a channel that is only on Samsung TV?

Gregory: Exclusivity is something we're really pushing. DAZN FAST Plus is exclusive to Samsung TV Plus and I think it's a way of selling the service and potentially selling TVs and devices in retail. You can form stronger partnerships because it's like you are trusted with someone's brand, their rights. And you get more granular into the schedule, and you can tweak it a bit more. Exclusivity differentiates us between a very competitive marketplace as well, whether that's FAST platforms or other OEMs.

Bruno: Chris and the Samsung TV Plus team are in a position to offer a compelling exclusivity option just because of their market share. So it may be that we [at ATP Media] look at it as if we were to do
LINK: https://www.sportsvideo.org/2023/12/05/fast-channels-part-two-why-they...
See more stories from svg

Most recent headlines

05/01/2027

Worlds first 802.15.4ab-UWB chip verified by Calterah and Rohde & Schwarz to be demoed at CES 2026

Worlds first 802.15.4ab-UWB chip verified by Calterah and Rohde & Schwarz to be ...

01/06/2026

Dolby Sets the New Standard for Premium Entertainment at CES 2026

January 6 2026, 05:30 (PST) Dolby Sets the New Standard for Premium Entertainment at CES 2026 Throughout the week, Dolby brings to life the latest innovatio...

02/05/2026

Dalet Flex LTS Delivers Smarter Search, Faster Editing, and an AI-Ready Foundation for Modern Media

Dalet, a leading technology and service provider for media-rich organizations, t...

01/05/2026

NBCUniversal's Peacock to Be First Streamer to Integrate Dolby's Full Suite of Premium Picture and Sound Innovations

January 5 2026, 18:30 (PST) NBCUniversal's Peacock to Be First Streamer to ...

01/04/2026

DOLBY AND DOUYIN EMPOWER THE NEXT GENERATON OF CREATORS WITH DOLBY VISION

January 4 2026, 18:00 (PST) DOLBY AND DOUYIN EMPOWER THE NEXT GENERATON OF CREATORS WITH DOLBY VISION Douyin Users Can Now Create And Share Videos With Stun...

26/03/2026

IMPORTANT FEEDBACK: PESP 6

The National Film and Video Foundation (NFVF), an agency of the Department of Sport, Arts and Culture (DSAC), has been tasked with administering the Sixth Presi...

26/03/2026

Why YEP Changed My Career (And Why It Might Change Yours)

By Matt Klein Hello to everyone reading this - whether you're a current YEP, HPA member, or just YEP-curious. I'm Matt Klein, one of the co-chairs of t...

26/03/2026

CBS Sports Inks New WNBA Deal

Share Copy link Facebook X Linkedin Bluesky Email...

26/03/2026

Apogee Insight Acquires PMA Research

Share Copy link Facebook X Linkedin Bluesky Email...

26/03/2026

NBC Announces Exclusive Coverage of Sail4th 250 Tall Ships in NYC

Share Copy link Facebook X Linkedin Bluesky Email...

26/03/2026

UK Group of media tech companies take the spotlight at NA...

28 participating companies, from start-ups to blue-chips, lead the UK Group as part of the GREAT Britain and Northern Ireland presence across all the Halls at N...

26/03/2026

Arkona Unveils BLADE//planner and Major Usability Enhancements at NAB 2026

Arkona Unveils BLADE//planner and Major Usability Enhancements at NAB 2026 Brie Clayton March 26, 2026 0 Comments New graphical configuration tool and...

26/03/2026

Bitfocus showcases complete control at NAB Show 2026

Bitfocus showcases complete control at NAB Show 2026 Brie Clayton March 26, 2026 0 Comments Continuing development drives advances in security, availa...

26/03/2026

Allen Media Group To Deploy Anoki ContextIQ

Share Copy link Facebook X Linkedin Bluesky Email...

26/03/2026

LG Announces New Premium FAST Channels

Share Copy link Facebook X Linkedin Bluesky Email...

26/03/2026

IABM to Host Breakfast Event at 2026 NAB Show

Share Copy link Facebook X Linkedin Bluesky Email...

26/03/2026

Nexstar Defends Tegna Deal in Calif. Court Filing

Share Copy link Facebook X Linkedin Bluesky Email...

26/03/2026

Nevion introduces powerful new Panel Builder to enhance VideoIPath broadcast control capability

Nevion introduces powerful new Panel Builder to enhance VideoIPath broadcast con...

26/03/2026

2026 Oscar Nominated Films Powered by Blackmagic Design

2026 Oscar Nominated Films Powered by Blackmagic Design Brie Clayton March 25, 2026 0 Comments DaVinci Resolve Studio used on 27 of this year's no...

26/03/2026

Leader to present full suite of advanced Test & Measurement solutions at NAB Show 2026

Leader to present full suite of advanced Test & Measurement solutions at NAB Sho...

26/03/2026

Boston Conservatory to Present New England and Collegiate Premiere of Groundbreaking Opera Time to Act

Boston Conservatory to Present New England and Collegiate Premiere of Groundbrea...

26/03/2026

Have a Wish Worth Dying For? Netflix's First Korean YA Horror Series If Wishes Could Kill' Premieres April 24

Back to All News Have a Wish Worth Dying For? Netflix's First Korean YA Hor...

26/03/2026

'The Truthers,' Starring Jose Coronado and Stphanie Magnin, Premieres on Netflix on 24 July

Back to All News The Truthers, Starring Jose Coronado and St phanie Magnin, Pre...

26/03/2026

Harmonic Delivers Winning Live Sports Streaming Innovations

Enhancements to Harmonic's Sports Streaming Solution Introduce Server-Side Multiview, Contextual Metadata-Driven Advertising, Dynamic In-Stream Ads and Robu...

26/03/2026

ABC Business Media Report: Trusted Data, Real Insight

Open the report Our 2025 report brings together results from 79 business magazine titles across 22 market sectors, published by 49 media owners. Over the year,...

26/03/2026

Into the Omniverse: NVIDIA GTC Showcases Virtual Worlds Powering the Physical AI Era

Editor's note: This post is part of Into the Omniverse, a series focused on ...

26/03/2026

Fiat to sponsor The Louise Duffy Show on RT Radio 1

RT Commercial today announced Fiat as sponsor of The Louise Duffy Show on RT Radio 1, Weekdays 3pm 4pm. The Louise Duffy Show is the home of daytime music...

26/03/2026

Game On: Five New Titles Now Streaming on GeForce NOW

That gaming backlog won't clear itself - GeForce NOW is here to help. Stream the latest titles straight from the cloud across a variety of devices. This we...

26/03/2026

Phantom C-Series High-Speed Cameras Set a New Standard for Automotive Crash and Safety Imaging

Wayne, N.J., March 26, 2026 Phantom High-Speed announces the latest product li...

25/03/2026

In The Hot Seat: The Art of Directing a Premier League Match

Live match directors Sarah Cheadle (Sky Sports), Rob Levi (TNT Sports), and Andrew Swift (BBC Sport) sit down with the Premier League's Rachel Nightingale t...

25/03/2026

SVG Students To Watch: Kyle Maier, St. Bonaventure University

The senior from Upstate New York is manning the mic while also interning for the athletic department's sports-information team In the live-sports-video ind...

25/03/2026

NAB 2026: Synamedia Launches Edge Watermarking Solution, Marks 10 Years of ContentArmor

Synamedia has announced ContentArmor Edge Watermarking, a server-side solution t...

25/03/2026

SES Taps K2 Space to Build meoSphere MEO Satellite Network

SES has announced meoSphere, a medium Earth orbit (MEO) satellite network targeted for operation by 2030. The first phase will pair SES-developed software-defin...

25/03/2026

Reuters and TVU Networks Begin Satellite-to-IP Migration for Live News Distribution

TVU Networks is working with Reuters on a phased migration from satellite to a c...

25/03/2026

Nielsen Names Three Senior Hires in Sports, Advertising, and Publishing Roles

Nielsen has announced three senior appointments. Seth Ladetsky has been named Head of Global Sports. Trevor Fellows will lead Nielsen's advertiser and agenc...

25/03/2026

Anoki and Amagi Bring Scene-Level Intelligence to In-Content CTV Ads

Anoki and Amagi have launched In-Scene Ads powered by Anoki ContextIQ across Amagi's portfolio of in-content ad formats for Free Ad-supported Streaming TV (...

25/03/2026

NAB 2026: Arkona to Unveil BLADE//planner and Platform Updates

Arkona Technologies will announce a series of enhancements to its BLADE//runner platform at NAB 2026 (Booth C.1808). The updates focus on usability and workflow...

25/03/2026

San Diego Padres Partners With Daktronics to Enhance Petco Park

Daktronics has installed two tower displays and a video wall in the Lexus Club at Petco Park in San Diego ahead of the 2026 season. Continuing to improve the ...

25/03/2026

NAB 2026: MultiDyne Marks 50th Anniversary

MultiDyne Video & Fiber Optic Systems is celebrating its 50th anniversary as NAB Show 2026 approaches. The company was founded in 1976 by Vincent Jachetta, an N...

25/03/2026

NAB 2026: IPC to Debut with One Connect Intercom Platform and New One Link Keypanels

IPC, a provider of integrated communication solutions, will make its NAB 2026 de...

25/03/2026

ESPN Tops 2026 Sports Emmy Nominations With 63 Nods

Live production categories were led by NBC, FOX, and ESPN's NFL coverage...

25/03/2026

Atlanta Braves and Spectrum Reach Multiyear Distribution Agreement for BravesVision

The Atlanta Braves and Spectrum have announced a multiyear distribution agreemen...

25/03/2026

The AI Doc Asks the Question No One Wants to Answer

(L-R) Charlie Tyrell and Daniel Roher attend The AI Doc: Or How I Became An Apocaloptimist Premiere during the 2026 Sundance Film Festival at The Ray Theatre ...

25/03/2026

Kelsey Lu and Savanah Leaf Lean Into the Emotional Core of Running To Pain' in Episode Three of Directed By'

Directed By, Spotify's documentary-style series that pulls back the curtain ...

25/03/2026

BTS and Spotify Bring ARIRANG' to Top Fans in New York City

BTS is so back., This week, the global pop superstars took the stage at New York City's Pier 17 for their first U.S. performance in four years. Part of Spo...

25/03/2026

Step Into Sound at Our New Spotify Listening Lounge in London

How you listen can shape what you hear. That's the idea behind the new Spotify Listening Lounge, an acoustic space at our London headquarters purpose-built ...

25/03/2026

Iconic Instruments launch Transport Vintage Tape

Tape effects taken to the extreme The latest release from New York-based developer Iconic Instruments is said to accurately recreate the saturation and comp...

25/03/2026

Sonuscore introduce Fantasy Vocal Phrases

Launched alongside new Vocal Phrases bundle Sonuscore's latest release has been designed specifically for composers working on fantasy TV, film and game...

25/03/2026

Steinberg unveil Nuendo 15

Latest update now live The latest version of Steinberg's post-production-focused DAW has just arrived, and comes packed with new dialogue editing, sound...