Edging further into the video streaming game, Sprint on Thursday announced it will offer its pre- and postpaid customers the chance to watch the upcoming Copa America soccer tournament for free on their mobile devices.
Sprint said the free access will be provided by fuboTV, which will stream the Spanish-language broadcasts via Univision for all the tournament games. Sprint said streaming of the games will not count against customer data allowances.
The carrier said fuboTV is offering a free 60-day trial for Sprint customers and a free 30-day trial for Boost and Virgin Mobile customers. After that period, the service will run customers $9.99 per month if they choose to keep it.
The Copa America tournament, which will be held in the United States for the first time this year, will take place in June with matches scheduled in venues across the country.
Sprint has previously unveiled plans to conduct 5G demonstrations in collaboration with Nokia and Ericsson during matches in Levis Stadium in Santa Clara, Calif., between June 3 and June 6 and Lincoln Financial Stadium in Philadelphia, Pa., June 9, 11 and 14.
Sprint CEO Marcelo Claure said the demonstrations will use “millimetric band radius to deliver 4K streaming of soccer content” at the games.
Sprint’s zero-rated data offer for Copa match streaming is far from the first free video offering in the carrier space. In November, T-Mobile unleashed Binge On, which allows its customers to stream unlimited free video from participating providers. Verizon in February offered its postpaid customers free video streaming on its go90 app through its FreeBee Data 360 sponsored data service. AT&T has also been playing around with sponsored data offerings.