What will happen with beIN Sport’s Canadian service after Jan. 6 deadline passes? By Steven Sandor Posted on October 24, 2013 9 0 970 Share on Facebook Share on Twitter To call beIN Sport’s rollout of its online Canadian service a “soft launch” might be a bit of an understatement. A couple of weeks ago, beIN Sports launched its online service for Canadian viewers, beIN Sport Play Canada. According to host Jeremy St. Louis, the service will be available on a free basis until Jan. 6. The network holds the Canadian rights to La Liga, Serie A, League Championship and Ligue 1 Games and, before the launch of the online service, that monopoly had aggrieved Canadian viewers. Why? Because the company does not have the CRTC’s blessing to broadcast over the domestic airwaves. The CRTC does not regulate Internet broadcasting. But, it took until Thursday for beIN’s head office to actually acknowledge the existence of beIN Sport Play Canada. It was included in a release about this weekend’s coverage of the Real Madrid-Barcelona El Clasico. In said release, there was a brief sentence about how Canadian fans can view the big game using the online service. That was all. One line. The 11 has been regularly in contact with beIN’s reps in the U.S., and we’ve submitted and then been asked to resubmit our questions about their plans for Canada. Mum is still the word from beIN’s head office when we ask if there are plans to approach the CRTC for a proper broadcast licence, or if beIN will try to add more Canadian programming (such as bidding for MLS, NASL or Canadian-national-team rights when they come up). We’ve asked how much the online service will cost after the Jan. 6 deadline. We’ll keep asking. Honestly, by now, I feel bad for the network reps, who have to be sick of hearing from me. And, during that time, the higher-ups at head office wouldn’t actually go so far as to address the very existence of beIN Sport Play Canada, even though the service is out in plain sight. We’ve covered the CRTC rules in previous posts (CLICK HERE). But it boils down to this, a foreign broadcaster can’t be approved for a Canadian licence if its content directly competes with a Canadian provider. Canada has its own sports channels and a pay service (Sportsnet World) that provides soccer programming. As well, the CRTC frowns on foreign broadcasters who apply for licences with exclusive foreign sports deals already in hand (which beIN does with La Liga, Serie A, etc.). The reason? Because they don’t allow Canadian broadcasters to have a chance at those broadcast rights. Basically, you’re not supposed to come in and influence the market until you have been approved to be in the market. If beIN — which affiliated with Al-Jazeera, was to partner with a Canadian broadcaster, or if it was to launch itself as a Canadian network, there could be ways forward. But, if it wants to broadcast in Canada, it will need to provide a quota of Canadian content, unless the CRTC decides to completely change the rules. But, for now, beIN is content to have what is a quiet rollout of its content. And we’re waiting to see what it has in store for Jan. 7, 2014, the day after the free online service is set to expire. NOTE: Late Thursday afternoon, beIN Sport issued a second El Clasico release which highlighted its, ahem, new Canadian service. Basically, it announced El Clasico would be available to Canadian viewers this Saturday, with pregame at 11 a.m. “BeIN Sport Play offers uncompromised international sports content to Canadian sports fans,” said Yousef Al-Obaidly, managing director of beIN Sport. “Our exciting worldwide coverage of the best athletes and best sports competitions is not available anywhere else.”
