Both Fox Sports and Claro Sports have the rights to broadcast Club León’s Liga MX matches on different platforms.
Why did Fox Sports withdraw the broadcast of the game?
Víctor Manuel Frías, a partner at the Greenberg Traurig firm and an expert in economic competition issues, explains that this is not the first time that a sports broadcast has been stopped by another company. He recalled that in 2003 TV Azteca withdrew from NBC the retransmission of a game of the Jaguares de Chiapas, arguing that the company did not have the transmission rights. This situation ended in court.
In the case of Fox Sports, the expert explains that although both companies have broadcast rights for the León team, in the rights contracts there is a text called in legal jargon ‘tacit resolution or tacit termination’ where a company can terminate the contractual agreement unilaterally. This situation could have happened between Fox Sports and Claro Sports.
“When there are disputes between the television networks, the one that is generating the transmission, in this case Fox Sports, removes it,” says the analyst.
Another explanation is a probable dispute between the two companies due to non-payment or exclusivity. Expansion Fox Sports requested position on the cessation of its broadcast but was not available for comment.
Can the transmission of a sports match be guaranteed?
The transmission of a Liga MX match depends entirely on the soccer teams, since they are the owners of those rights and the ones who sign the contracts with television stations and now also with streaming companies, so that their games are broadcast on different platforms.
In this sense, the expert points out that the only thing that can guarantee the transmission of a sports match is the contract and not the regulatory authorities such as the Federal Telecommunications Institute (IFT) because the transmission agreements are the private property of the television teams. soccer.
However, what the regulatory entities, such as the IFT, can do is ensure compliance with the transmission rights contracts that the companies have to ensure that there continues to be a process of open competition between content companies. In the specific case of Fox Sports, the IFT is responsible for investigating the reasons that led the company to lower the broadcast of the match to determine if they are terms of the contract or if there was an abuse of broadcasting rights to avoid the competition process.
What about the hearings?
The advancement of technology has changed the business model of sports, especially its transmission, which is already affecting users worldwide.
For example, the Barcelona club, which does not have enough resources to sign players, is now betting on selling 25% of its transmission rights to an investment fund, which in turn could negotiate the percentage of its transmission rights. with the television networks.
This situation makes consumers the most affected and more so because “there is no general right of the audience to see a show in a democratic way. In other words, no authority can compel teams and companies to broadcast on certain signals, since sports are a privately owned show,” says the expert.
“Neither the IFT nor any competition body can do anything about this, and I am not aware of any international experience where any authority tells companies that they have to broadcast a game on open television because it is a cultural right. And if there were, it would be an expropriation, because it would be taking ownership of their show from the teams to make it a public thing,” Frías warned.
The specialist foresees that, as more players want to get the transmission rights of the matches, it is possible that the transmission interruptions will continue.