Disney CEO: ESPN could be sold directly to consumers

However, while HBO can offer its streaming channel for $14.99 a month, Disney might have to offer ESPN at a much higher price.

In appearing on CNBC, Iger also discussed the possibility of the Disney Channel being sold directly to viewers at some point down the road.

“If we end up seeing more erosion in the so-called multichannel [cable and satellite dish TV] bundle, quality will win out”, Iger said. “The business model may face some challenges over the next few years”.

Bob Iger, the head of ESPN’s parent company Walt Disney, sees continued unbundling by consumers and envisions a time when the network’s content could be sold directly to consumers, the way HBO is.

Meanwhile, ESPN charges $6.61 per subscriber, on average, making it far and away the most expensive programming network to license, among both broadcast and cable channels.

Iger told CNBC’s “Squawk Box” that ESPN could at some point bypass distributors like Home Box Office’s direct-to-consumer HBO Now offering, but said that ESPN would look for much deeper penetration into the marketplace. ESPN is paying around $2 billion a year to the NFL just to show Monday Night Football, for example, and another $1.7 billion a season to present National Basketball Association games.

A potential ESPN stand-alone product has been of great interest to many in the media industry being that ESPN holds contracts with many popular sports leagues including the NFL and the College Football Playoff, and that live sports bring in some of the biggest ratings on TV.

The costs for its programming, meanwhile, are rising faster than anywhere in the pay-TV ecosystem.