Where do you think the future of streaming is headed?CEO Bob Bowman of MLBAM said he expects revenues to be 1.2-1.3 Billion in 2016 up from 800m in 2015. With 2016 revenues split 80/20 between baseball and third party revenues which is what the spin off BAMTECH is doing. So thats a 240-260million revenue coming from bam tech and third party streaming. That is 14x forward looking sales that disney paid.
https://blog.devoncroft.com/2016/07/05/disney-expected-to-acquire-33-stake-in-bam-tech/
I don't think you can value the companies that same way and they both have different buisness models even though they are in the same space. Bamtech is a rights purchaser for sports and is able to create large amount of revenues from owning the rights vs Neulion who only works with rights holders and takes a small fees per transaction plus set up fees while the rights holders get all the other revenue. With rights holder you take more risk by paying large amount of money up front but get all the proceeds from subscricptions as well as the advertisments I believe which can be huge.
Charm as for technology I don't really believe that Neulion has any real advantage over BAMTECH in fact they are at a big disadvantage with the likes of Disney and MLB behind BamTech. Disney is a 165billion dollar company and can just throw their weight into Bamtech without breaking a sweat. And with the option of Disney to get a majority stake come January, Neulion is facing big competition domistically from Bamtech now. They already stole the NHL and pushing in the smaller college markets.
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-08-22/baseball-s-bamtech-invests-in-college-sports-streaming-company
If Bamtech had a IPO id probably just own both but since I can't I still bet my money on Neulion to succeed even with some recent poor quarters below expectations. Its based on few factors.
1-Most of the deals Neulion has made recently will be year if not longer to realize good returns thus will have to wait like the rugby deal in Asia. They are pushing very well internationally and Bamtech is focused domestic. Soccer (real football), Cricket, rugby, field hockey, tennis are all major sports outside the US with the NFL barely cracking the top 10 based on fan and viewers. Very big market outside the US which they are expanding.
2-The future of how rights deals are completed is changing and I believe the multi billion dollar deals will be dead. Considering Bamtech is doing rights deals it is not where the future will lay in down the road. I believe this is based on cord cutting and how easy it is to stream and get games to fans without have to go through networks. If a network can offer 100million a year for the rights how much are they making each year. Probably over double that. So why would sports league sell the rights if they can do it in house or hire somoene like Neulion to stream and pay a fee. They have just been used to the instant money and no risk that comes with the big deals. Networks won't be able to offer the kind of money they have in the past as they are losing subscriptions left right and center. NHL viewer ship was down 67% during playoffs due to no canadian team in the playoffs which is a big hit to rogers and the 450million they pay the nhl each year. This is very evident with the way things are going if you just look at the clippers deal and Ballmer pushing to keep the streaming rights which would make it the first in the 4 major leagues to do so. Its a slow process but believe it is going to happen more and more. Just depends if they develop the ott in house or hire Neulion or possible Bamtech.
https://www.sporttechie.com/2016/09/23/broadcast/la-clippers-sign-new-tv-rights-deal-not-include-new-ott-services/
Anyways this is a bit long but that's just my take on Neulion. I have followed them for many years now and expected a bit better quartely and yearly results but the industry is changing so will hold a portion long term 5+ years and keep trading other portion as it is very volitile. Any buyout I believe will be 7-9x so $2.5-$3.2. With so many shares outstanding and high percentage of insiders owning Neulion won't sell. They would rather hold long as well and wait for higher valuation with better returns unless things change and they want out. No one will come in and offer a way higher valuation doesn't make snese they have yet to make profit. GLTA