WWE Looking to Purchase Fite TV Streaming Service

WWE is reportedly looking to buy the sports streaming service platform Fite TV.

As per the Wrestling Observer Newsletter, WWE officials are in talks with Fite TV. However, there is no word on at what stage the talks are at the moment, but upcoming meetings are scheduled between the two parties. This will be an interesting move because Fite TV is the streaming partner for several wrestling promotions like AEW ROH, MLW, NJPW, GCW, WLW, Impact Wrestling, the Reality of Wrestling and several other independent wrestling promotions.

The benefits for WWE to purchase Fite TV can be two folds. First will be that they could use the technology from Fite TV to better their own streaming service WWE Network. The second will be that WWE owning Fite TV might force other wrestling promotions to drastically change their methods of distribution and look for other streaming options for their shows.

Although many of these promotions also stream their shows on other services, it will still be a huge blow. Also, it is currently not clear in what capacity will WWE use Fite TV. Meltzer speculates that WWE might use FITE as part of the tiered Network subscription levels that was confirmed during last month’s Q2 2019 earnings call. But whether they will continue to stream sports other than pro-wrestling like MMA, boxing and others is not clear at this point.