Motor racing-After U.S. deal, Apple's global F1 push may take time

Apple hopes to enter other markets after securing a five-year U.S. streaming deal to show Formula One races on Apple TV. Yet differing media ‌rights cycles may act as a brake on the $4.37-trillion tech company’s global ambitions. The Liberty Media-owned single seater is a popular live sports championship amongst fans, streaming services and traditional broadcasters.

“We have a buy on F1. I think you can really see that the sport is exploding in popularity. I think it's gaining ‌ground even in some of the more mature markets like Europe and the U.S. has really gained ground,” said Matthew Harrigan, an equity research analyst for Benchmark Company. Bernstein, a research and brokerage firm, estimated that F1’s media rights would be a key revenue driver in 2026, reaching between $90 million and $110 million.

“Live sports are such a valuable asset to have in terms of a TV or a streaming contract… And so when you're able to ‌find one of these relatively smaller and quickly rising ones, there's going to be a lot of competition,” Morningstar’s Senior Equity Analyst William Kerwin told Reuters. Comcast-owned Sky agreed to extend its F1 media rights ‌deal to 2034 in the U.K. and 2032 in Italy at a premium price of one billion pounds ($1.34 billion), according to industry sources, ahead of its original 2029 expiration year in the U.K.

The extension follows positive first-quarter results for F1 this year, achieving $617 million in revenue, a 53% increase on last year, despite the cancellation of the Bahrain and Saudi Arabian races in April. Conversely, analysts assert that Sky, F1’s exclusive U.K. broadcaster since 2019, renewed their deal from a position of caution rather than strength.

“I think that ⁠Sky felt vulnerable there… Sky knew that the U.K. was a very ⁠attractive market for Apple,” Francois Godard, an independent analyst, told Reuters. Godard also said that after the U.S., the U.K. was the next top market in Europe given it had “more e-ecommerce, more subscriptions to online newspapers, more subscriptions to video services”.

The current incumbents in ⁠Europe have varying F1 media rights cycles: French broadcaster Canal+'s deal ends in 2029, while sports streaming platform DAZN has an exclusive agreement to broadcast Grands Prix in Spain until the end of the 2026 season. “If Apple truly does want to make this kind of a more global push, they're going to do it region by region… and wait until these deals expire just to be able to try and compete ⁠for them,” Kerwin said.

Apple’s next best bet in Europe might be the home of past world champions such as Michael Schumacher, Nico Rosberg and Sebastian Vettel. “If Apple wants to deploy in one other market, I would look at Germany. Big market, rich, and a big ⁠Formula One constituency. And the pay-TV market is in flux after the merger between Sky and RTL,” Godard said.

European broadcaster RTL received EU approval to acquire pay-TV Sky Deutschland, which had F1 media rights till 2027. Traditional broadcasters such as Canal+, which has no domestic rights to France’s top soccer division Ligue 1, and RTL would feel pre-empted to warn off a potential threat from Apple by emulating Sky.

The iPhone maker, however, ⁠could look beyond European territories if the classic markets are unavailable. “East Asia certainly Africa, Apple can do things there… there's much more upside potential there, both on viewing and in terms of Apple sales,” ⁠said Harrigan.

Yet an entry into a non-U.S. market does not ⁠guarantee success. “It’s a risk because not a lot of people already have it [Apple TV]. You might lose viewership if you were to adopt an exclusive deal for a service that people don't want to pay for in addition,” William said, noting that Apple TV was predominately a U.S. subscriber base.

Apple TV offers ‌new and current subscribers a chance ‌to switch commentary feeds during races: from F1 TV to U.K.'s Sky Sports broadcasting team. ($1 = 0.7459 pounds)