While its closest competitors are only interested in generative artificial intelligence, Apple is launching with… live sports scores. The iPhone maker launched a mobile application on Wednesday that aims to fill a gap in a sports and entertainment industry that appears to be still undergoing transformation.
The application, laconically called “Sports”, appears only for the iPhone, which may seem surprising for a company that has invested heavily in televising sports in recent years via its Apple TV platform.
It requires a bit of tinkering on the part of users, especially when it comes to the notifications sent to the phone's locked screen. It joins a whole range of other applications of the same type, including those from sports leagues and media. It provides quick live information that you can get at a glance about the results of past and current games, the time of upcoming games and the general and current performance of teams and players. from around ten professional leagues from around the world. These include the main North American major leagues as well as some European soccer leagues.
Apple's goal is to make its sports application a central point for live sports information for all interested leagues. For example, the Canadian Football League, which has been slow to make the digital transition, could take the first step in this direction by partnering with such an application.
On the condition that its partners include a company whose specialty is collecting data during its games. Because it is not the leagues themselves that manage their digital data, but third-party companies. And there are many. Bringing all these companies together to create a single application is a huge challenge, emphasized Eddy Cue, Apple's senior vice president of services, at a conference with some media outlets.
Live sport is changing
The latter personally led the project because, as he says, there was a lack of a simple and quick way for even the least connected sports fans to follow all their favorite teams at once.
For Apple, it's a small gesture that says a lot about what goes on behind the scenes in the sports and entertainment industries. Digital platforms have discovered a huge appetite for live events recently, and esports offers them on a daily basis. In a State of the Media report published in 2023, Deloitte calculated that of the $50 billion it invested in video content last year, $6 billion went into acquiring live sports rights. It's a highlight.
While traditional television networks struggle to grow advertising revenue and see their subscriber numbers decline, digital giants have other ways to make this type of investment profitable.
Apple's sports application also displays the odds for each team by default to facilitate online sports betting, an increasingly central phenomenon in the world of professional sports. It will not be possible to bet directly in the application, but this opens up new marketing opportunities, both for Apple and for companies in this sector.
However, platforms' interest in sports has led to an outselling of competing and expensive services that consumers are becoming less and less fond of. In the same report cited previously, Deloitte concludes that the key to the success of these platforms is having the most comprehensive content offering. “It will take two or three rounds of broadcast rights negotiations before the future of live sports becomes clear,” the consultancy wrote. For platforms that operate for the long term, the key will be to integrate social media, sports betting, garage leagues and other digital engagement tools. ยป
Eddy Cue and Apple seem to have gotten the message.