Can Old TV Brands Take Off On Streaming?

Just a few months in the past, HBO content material chief Casey Bloys and Warner Bros. Discovery streaming chief JB Perrette approached the corporate’s management, together with CEO David Zaslav, with a suggestion.

They’d been conducting analysis across the streaming service Max, making an attempt to gauge what subscribers had been watching and what they weren’t, which manufacturers mattered to them and which didn’t.

The corporate additionally checked out how they had been really utilizing the platform. As has since develop into clear, the outcomes confirmed that high quality mattered, which led the corporate to regulate its client proposition in favor of premium fare. Inside Warner Bros. Discovery, no model exemplifies high quality and premium TV greater than HBO. So given the brand new positioning, they advisable a pivot: Take Max and switch again the clock, re-renaming the streaming service HBO Max, leaning into one of many oldest manufacturers in linear TV exterior of the published networks.

“As we’ve got articulated this new technique publicly over the previous couple of months we’ve got obtained commentary for a lot of of our followers and observers, who’ve instructed that the HBO model ought to subsequently return to the title of the service,” Casey Bloys informed media patrons and advertisers concerning the determination on the Warner Bros. Discovery upfront presentation Might 14. “Nicely, whereas they had been grumbling, we had been doing our personal assessments. My crew and I are effectively conscious of what the HBO model means to the business and to shoppers.”

And so later this summer season, the HBO title as soon as once more shall be elevated as WBD embraces the standard that it’s recognized for.

“The HBO Max reversal isn’t only a branding U-turn; it’s a flashing neon signal pointing to a important juncture within the streaming panorama that the ‘content material is king’ mantra is lifeless; model fairness now reigns supreme,” says Sunaina Sharma, govt technique director at Landor, the WPP-owned model consultancy. Or, as one veteran govt frames it: In a media enterprise present process immense change, “you possibly can’t be afraid to course right.”

Actually, the 2025 upfronts revealed a shocking flip of occasions within the newest iteration of the streaming wars: Linear TV manufacturers matter. Quite a bit. 

Afterward within the WBD upfront, CNN CEO Mark Thompson unveiled plans for a brand new CNN streaming service to debut later this fall below the straightforward, easy CNN model, no “+” required:

“It’ll be our first true information streaming service. One easy technique to discover the easiest of CNN journalism in your cellphone, your linked TV, or different digital system, first within the U.S., quickly anyplace on the planet, stay channels and information feeds, unique programming and different content material and all of the storytellers our audiences know and belief, folks like Audie [Cornish] and Anderson [Cooper], Kaitlan [Collins, Abby [Phillip] and the remainder of the CNN world crew.”

A supply says that a number of high-profile CNN journalists have been pitching Thompson and high deputy Alex MacCallum on present concepts, with a heavy emphasis on journalism-forward packages quite than ancillary ideas like parenting reveals or guide golf equipment, as CNN+ had. In different phrases, content material most intently related to the CNN model. The streaming providing shall be half of a bigger CNN subscription, which can probably embrace entry to content material on its web site and vertical way of life choices, the primary of which shall be a climate app. 

A day earlier than WBD’s branding pivot with HBO and CNN, The Walt Disney Co. made information of its personal: ESPN’s long-anticipated streaming service, which had been working internally below the code title “Flagship,” would launch this 12 months below the understated however apparent title “ESPN.”

“As we explored choices, we stored coming again to our 4 letters: ESPN,” ESPN chief Jimmy Pitaro informed reporters within the glistening library of Disney’s Robert A. Iger constructing in Manhattan (Iger himself popped by that morning to say hi there too). “There’s energy in our title and there’s belief in our title, together with, by the best way, from the youthful technology who love ESPN, and so they see us as a digital first model. ESPN is the place of report, and we characterize the easiest in sports activities. In order that’s what we’re calling it. ESPN. Easy, easy, clear.”

“There’s unmatched energy and readability in our 4 letters, and we wished to maintain it easy,” added ESPN govt VP Rosalyn Durant.

At a second when linear TV is in inescapable decline, all of a sudden the linear TV manufacturers are making a comeback. It seems, in a streaming world dominated by Pluses and Maxes and Professionals, media corporations are all of a sudden discovering that manufacturers do in reality matter to shoppers. Disney and WBD could also be executing on that now, however others are additionally shifting in the identical course.

“This might set off a wave of strategic re-evaluations throughout the streaming world with platforms doubling down on their distinctive strengths, consolidating to construct model energy, or making surprising alliances,” says Sharma.

Over cocktails at Netflix’s post-upfront reception in New York, one attendee puzzled whether or not Skydance would pivot on the Paramount+ model, assuming it is ready to shut its acquisition. Whereas it’s an iconic movie studio, Paramount doesn’t have the model cachet of Disney, and its TV model is outlined solely by Yellowstone. Paramount has let its cable TV channels like MTV and VH1 wither with an absence of programming, although CBS stays related because of its sports activities and leisure portfolio. Chatting with reporters final 12 months, Jeff Shell, Skydance’s choose to develop into president of the mixed firm, mentioned they might take a “recent strategy” to Paramount+ after they full the deal however had been dedicated to streaming.

Or think about NBCUniversal and its upcoming spinoff Versant. When Comcast determined to separate off its cable TV channels, it strategically stored Bravo for itself. Why? As a result of the Bravo model has develop into synonymous with a particular kind of highbrow-lowbrow actuality program. No matter occurs to Bravo the cable channel, Bravo the model is all however assured to outlive. And as soon as the spinoff is full and Peacock goes all in on the NBA, the streaming platform may have a whole lot of NBC branding throughout its platform because of its heavy sports activities slate, whereas Bravo serves because the in-house model for actuality.

Equally, Versant is supposed to permit the beforehand ignored or underinvested cable manufacturers like Syfy and E! to get an opportunity to shine. In a memo to workers, Versant CEO Mark Lazarus says that the corporate’s title is supposed to function a “home for our unbelievable manufacturers.”

“It speaks to our adaptability and embraces the chance to form a brand new, trendy media firm,” he continued. To that finish, CNBC has already launched a CNBC+ streaming service, and MSNBC is claimed to be exploring its choices in streaming and digital choices as effectively, notably with CNN and Fox Information having already introduced plans to take action.

Fox is an fascinating case. The corporate additionally introduced plans for a direct-to-consumer streaming service and used its upfront to tout the service, which shall be referred to as Fox One, with the Fox TV model entrance and heart. 

“We imagine that Fox’s go-to-market technique for Fox One is effectively aligned with the present panorama,” writes MoffettNathanson analyst Robert Fishman in a Might 12 report. “Set to launch forward of soccer season, Fox One will look to enrich, quite than cannibalize, its linear portfolio. Fox said that each one current conventional subscribers may have entry to Fox One, guaranteeing the platform doesn’t compete with distribution companions.”

Certainly, simply as streaming manufacturers are embracing their linear TV roots, streaming itself additionally appears to be shifting in that course. WBD and ESPN executives had been keen to notice that pay TV subscribers will get entry to CNN and ESPN streaming (which means no further charges, at the least for now), simply as they may Fox One.

And with Constitution Communications — which has aggressively sought to bundle streaming companies inside its video bundles — in search of to amass Cox Communications with intentions to broaden that technique, it seems like the brand new branded choices may have a accomplice keen and in a position to assist them with that plan.

It’s virtually as in the event that they nonetheless see worth within the old school TV bundle, although as LightShed analyst Wealthy Greenfield wrote in a Might 14 observe, the media corporations (or on the very least Disney) might very effectively have an ulterior motive. “If ESPN can drive MVPD and vMVPD subscribers to make use of the ESPN app as an alternative of watching on Comcast, DirecTV, or YouTube TV, they may lastly have a direct relationship with their viewers,” Greenfield wrote. “This might enable them to know what viewers watch, goal promoting in a much more compelling approach and attempt to have interaction viewers past stay video games (whether or not that be highlights, merchandise, sports activities betting, fantasy, and so forth).”

Wall Avenue analysts suspect that the streaming model of ESPN might see mid-single-digit hundreds of thousands in subscribers, but when it really works, notably within the bigger bundle, there may be much more upside. “Whereas there could also be upside to our Sports activities section estimates if Disney is profitable reaching these sorts of subscriber ranges, the extra impactful raise to DIS shares probably comes from bundling ESPN streaming into Disney Plus and Hulu,” Morgan Stanley’s Ben Swinburne wrote Might 12.

If the brand new world of streaming can preserve the pay TV bundle alive, leisure corporations will gladly take it. However even when it doesn’t, if they’ll leverage their legacy linear manufacturers to achieve a digital foothold, it’s at the least a step in the precise course.

This story first appeared within the Might 21 problem of The Hollywood Reporter journal. To obtain the journal, click here to subscribe.