Sky to acquire Discovery NZ (TV Three)

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#3396176 22-Jul-2025 14:09

No debt with it, snip from Stuff's writeup:

Sky announced it had “agreed to acquire 100% of the shares in Discovery NZ Limited from Discovery Networks Asia-Pacific Pte Ltd (a subsidiary of Warner Bros. Discovery, Inc.) ” for $1 on a cash-free, debt-free basis.

old3eyes

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#3396177 22-Jul-2025 14:10

Not particularly impressed with this news. Basically gives Sky a monopoly of the TV business. Wonder how long before some of the WBD channels go off air??

Regards,

Old3eyes

muppet

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#3396185 22-Jul-2025 14:52

old3eyes:

Not particularly impressed with this news. Basically gives Sky a monopoly of the TV business. Wonder how long before some of the WBD channels go off air??

Yeah I'll be lost without Ghosthunters on 24/7

alasta

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#3396199 22-Jul-2025 16:02

Handsomedan:

I can't imagine my elderly parents or their friends being happy about a digital-only TV future, but in 10-20 years, when they're all gone? Absolutely do-able.

Yes, my elderly father has made it clear that he thinks IP streaming TV is "too complicated" despite the fact that using my Apple TV is substantially easier than programming his Freeview recorder.

Until now I would have predicted that WBD would pull the plug on linear broadcasting within the next year or two, and focus on ThreeNow as a low cost, low revenue commercial model. The future is less clear to me now as Sky's business seems to be still entrenched in linear broadcasting.

wellygary

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#3396201 22-Jul-2025 16:15

DjShadow:

No debt with it, snip from Stuff's writeup:

Sky announced it had “agreed to acquire 100% of the shares in Discovery NZ Limited from Discovery Networks Asia-Pacific Pte Ltd (a subsidiary of Warner Bros. Discovery, Inc.) ” for $1 on a cash-free, debt-free basis.

Yeah, but further down in the story they talk about inheriting the existing on-going contracts, (and presumably all the remaining employment contracts too) - so its not totally without ongoing liabilities...

"Sky chief executive Sophie Moloney said they would honour existing contracts, including Stuff’s deal with Warner Bros Discovery to produce a nightly news bulletin.

“We are excited about ThreeNews and what we can do with Stuff going forward.”

Moloney said there would be no change to Stuff’s existing contract with ThreeNews; however, she would not say how long that contract was for.

nztim

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#3396215 22-Jul-2025 16:43

alasta:

The future is less clear to me now as Sky's business seems to be still entrenched in linear broadcasting.

Linear still has its place for live events, TAB will not be happy if Trackside and sports channels have a 2-minute streaming delay - Live betting is big business

Also when I watch a game away from home on Skygo I have to shut my phone off, people at the stadium or watching on linear messaging me on FB and not even seen the play yet

I guess endoding and decoding will eventually improve and this 2 minute delay will get reduiced

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#3396220 22-Jul-2025 17:18

https://www.nzherald.co.nz/business/sky-tv-tv3-deal-why-sky-tv-bought-three-and-whats-next/C65VZQIN3NGW7L7UTT6W246BTI/

The deal in a nutshell

In a statement to the NZX, Sky said the deal to buy 100% of shares in Discovery NZ for $1 was expected to be:

Debt-free with “a clean balance sheet largely clear of long-term obligations, including property leases”
Deliver Sky revenue $95m extra annual revenue, with about 25% from digital sources
Add to Sky’s existing audience a growing digital audience via ThreeNow, a BVOD (broadcaster video on demand) platform that recently recorded its 12th straight quarter of viewership growth
Grow Sky’s combined total linear television advertising revenue share to about 35% and total digital television advertising revenue share to about 24%
Deliver material cost synergies primarily across Sky’s content and broadcasting infrastructure
Deliver a pathway to achieve incremental, underlying free cash flow from FY26 and sustainable ebitda (interest before tax, depreciation and amortisation) growth of at least $10m from FY28.

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#3396221 22-Jul-2025 17:20

Handsomedan:

I can't imagine my elderly parents or their friends being happy about a digital-only TV future, but in 10-20 years, when they're all gone? Absolutely do-able.

They simply won't have a choice, get them on a fire stick/googletv/appletv today so they can learn the app stuff. Like it or not both Three and TVNZ has signaled they will be digital only by late 2029 at the latest(Three likely even sooner).

Both major parties have no real intent of supporting DTT for an extended period of time, Labour refused to reduce or remove transmission fees despite knowing Discovery was in poor shape etc.

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#3396243 22-Jul-2025 20:01

Handsomedan:

I can't imagine my elderly parents or their friends being happy about a digital-only TV future, but in 10-20 years, when they're all gone? Absolutely do-able.

If they had the choice to be paid less in superannuation to allow the government to maintain the existing FTA network they’d quickly discover a love of streaming.

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#3396296 22-Jul-2025 21:58

This also gives Sky the 3 and 4 slots on the Freeview remote. Look for 3 to get renamed to Sky 3 and Bravo to swap channel numbers with Sky Open. Sky said a few weeks ago that they are losing the Paramount channels and were looking at creating some of their own channels to replace them. So I would expect some of those channels will have a lot of WarnerDiscovery content.

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#3396298 22-Jul-2025 22:19

Handsomedan:

I can't imagine my elderly parents or their friends being happy about a digital-only TV future, but in 10-20 years, when they're all gone? Absolutely do-able.

i thought so too, then i gave my parents a new TV, set up, netflix, plex, TVNZ and Threenow on it... and they love it. My 84 year old father is a giant digital curmudgeon, but even he managed to work it out.... mostly

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alasta

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#3396370 23-Jul-2025 08:46

Handle9:

Handsomedan:

I can't imagine my elderly parents or their friends being happy about a digital-only TV future, but in 10-20 years, when they're all gone? Absolutely do-able.

If they had the choice to be paid less in superannuation to allow the government to maintain the existing FTA network they’d quickly discover a love of streaming.

It's worth keeping in mind that Kordia's broadcasting infrastructure also supports FM radio. This raises an interesting question; if linear TV ceases, does that mean that Mediaworks and NZME would have to bear more cost for their radio transmissions and how would that impact the viability of that service? NZME's radio audience is rapidly aging, and it wasn't long ago that the auditors of Mediaworks were flagging an emerging financial crisis for the company.

FM radio has been kept alive largely by NZ's embarrassingly old vehicle fleet, but that won't last forever.

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#3396386 23-Jul-2025 09:02

Lifeline broadcast capability is a thing to consider.

No signature to see here, move along...

old3eyes

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#3396390 23-Jul-2025 09:15

Handle9:

Handsomedan:

I can't imagine my elderly parents or their friends being happy about a digital-only TV future, but in 10-20 years, when they're all gone? Absolutely do-able.

If they had the choice to be paid less in superannuation to allow the government to maintain the existing FTA network they’d quickly discover a love of streaming.

I bet not. I know plenty of older people who have no idea on how to stream content are quite happy with OTA TV and and and a Sky remote. Some "younger" people here seems like they can't wait for all forms of broadcast TV and fm radio to die along with the boomer generation.

Regards,

Old3eyes

richms

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#3396396 23-Jul-2025 09:29

alasta:

It's worth keeping in mind that Kordia's broadcasting infrastructure also supports FM radio. This raises an interesting question; if linear TV ceases, does that mean that Mediaworks and NZME would have to bear more cost for their radio transmissions and how would that impact the viability of that service? NZME's radio audience is rapidly aging, and it wasn't long ago that the auditors of Mediaworks were flagging an emerging financial crisis for the company.

FM radio has been kept alive largely by NZ's embarrassingly old vehicle fleet, but that won't last forever.

FM is JDA in at least a couple of markets, not kordia.

Even people I know with bluetooth in their car, and in some cases carplay/android auto still hang on to listening to FM because they "like it" - I am assuming that its some form of Stockholm syndrome or something.

Richard rich.ms

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