Pay-television broadcaster Sky New Zealand looks set to lose rights to the Formula 1 World Championship according to the New Zealand Herald.
The newspaper had mentioned Sky did enter a bid for the rights from the 2019 season, but this was ultimately rejected as the bid was not competitive enough to be able to retain their right to broadcast F1 in the area.
Sky will show the remainder of the 2018 F1 season, however, it is understood to have been concerned over a fall in ratings owing to later start times introduced for European races and the availability of official highlights via social media platform Facebook.
A lot of F1 fans have instead been using the Facebook highlights package which has been freely made available from Mondays just hours after the race has occurred.
A recent move by commercial rights holder Liberty Media is thought to have played a large role in the decision, European rounds of the championship have now shifted an hour later to a start time of 1am on Monday mornings in New Zealand with races on the American continent happening at 7am leaving many unable to watch the events of races.
It has yet to be confirmed whether the F1TV packages available directly from F1 launched earlier in 2018 – will be made available to the region for the 2019 season and beyond, or if a new broadcaster is willing to make a bid for the rights to show F1.
F1TV has different options available for fans can choose what type of access they wish to purchase which include live coverage (dependant on the country's broadcast right status), highlights, classic races among other content.
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