Who owns Fubo? Ownership structure explained (2026)

Fubo is the rare company that sued three of the largest media companies in the United States, won, and then sold control of itself to one of them. In February 2024 it filed an antitrust suit against Disney, Fox, and Warner Bros. Discovery over Venu Sports, a planned sports streaming joint venture. In August 2024 a federal judge blocked Venu from launching. In January 2025 Fubo announced it would combine with Disney's Hulu + Live TV business, with Disney taking about 70% of the merged company.

That transaction closed on October 29, 2025, after the Department of Justice ended its antitrust review without challenge. Fubo did not disappear into Disney. It remains a listed company with a ticker, a public float, and quarterly earnings calls. What changed is who decides. Disney holds a class of stock carrying 70% of the votes, appoints four directors, and in July 2026 installed its own executive as chief executive.

Understanding who owns Fubo means understanding a structure that looks independent and functions as a subsidiary. This article traces the founders, the venture backers, the lawsuit that produced the deal, and what Disney's majority stake means for the roughly 5.8 million households that pay for the service.

Fubo launched on January 1, 2015, as FuboTV, a streaming service built around soccer. It cost $7 a month and carried a handful of soccer-focused channels. The founders were David Gandler, who became chief executive, Alberto Horihuela, who ran marketing, and Sung Ho Choi. The company is headquartered in Midtown Manhattan, New York City.

The narrow product did not last. In 2017 Fubo widened its lineup to all sports, then rebuilt itself as a virtual multichannel video programming distributor, or vMVPD. That is the industry term for a service that sells a cable-style channel bundle over the internet. Fubo kept marketing itself as sports-first while adding news, entertainment, and premium movie channels, putting it in direct competition with YouTube TV, Sling TV, DirecTV Stream, and Hulu + Live TV.

The economics of that business are unforgiving. A vMVPD buys channels wholesale from programmers and resells them, which means most of every subscription dollar leaves as a carriage payment before anything else is covered. Fubo lost money every year as a standalone business, and an adjacent bet on sports betting launched in 2021 was shut down in 2022.

The company today is much larger than it was as an independent operator. For its third fiscal quarter of 2026, ended in June, FuboTV Inc. reported global revenue of $1.482 billion, a net loss of $25.7 million, and 5.75 million paid North American subscribers, which it called a third-quarter record and up 2% year over year. A further 356,000 subscribers come from Molotov, the French streaming service Fubo bought in 2021.

That scale is almost entirely borrowed from Disney. FuboTV Inc. now operates two consumer brands in the United States: the Fubo app and Hulu + Live TV, the live television tier that used to sit inside Disney's on-demand service. The on-demand Hulu library did not come with it and remains Disney's alone, a distinction that matters when reading who owns Hulu.

FuboTV Inc. trades on the New York Stock Exchange under the ticker FUBO. It files quarterly reports, holds annual meetings, and has a public float. It is also, in the company's own words, an affiliate of The Walt Disney Company.

Both statements are true because of the share structure created at closing. Every existing Fubo common share converted one for one into Class A common stock. Disney's Hulu subsidiary received 947,910,220 newly issued shares of Class B common stock representing 70% of the total voting power. After a 1-for-12 reverse stock split completed on March 23, 2026, that reduced to roughly 79.0 million Class B shares against about 29.4 million Class A shares.

So the arithmetic is straightforward. Disney holds about 70% of the equity and 70% of the votes. Public shareholders hold roughly 30% of a company they cannot outvote on any matter Disney cares about. Fubo's independence is procedural rather than practical.

Fubo's founders no longer hold meaningful control, and the company has never published their individual stakes beyond what proxy filings require of executive officers.

David Gandler led Fubo from 2015 through July 2026, taking it through a reverse merger, an IPO, the Venu lawsuit, and the Disney combination. He held shares and options as chief executive, but his position was diluted repeatedly: first by the venture rounds, then by the 2020 public offering, then by the issuance of Class B stock to Disney that reset the entire cap table. Alberto Horihuela is the only founder still in an operating role, as chief operating officer. Sung Ho Choi has kept a low public profile and holds no announced role.

What is confirmed is that no founder holds a controlling or blocking position. What is not disclosed is how much of the remaining 30% Class A pool the founders and former executives hold today, and Fubo has no obligation to break that out beyond standard beneficial ownership reporting.

Fubo raised venture capital in its first five years, then changed hands twice through corporate transactions rather than conventional funding rounds. The table below combines both, because the venture rounds alone do not explain who owns the company.

Reported pre-IPO equity funding totals vary slightly across funding trackers, clustering around $150 million. Treat the round-level figures as reported rather than audited, since Fubo was private at the time and did not confirm every raise.

Northzone, the European venture firm best known as an early Spotify backer, led the roughly $55 million Series C in June 2017. That round funded the shift from a soccer app into a general sports bundle, the decision that made the rest of Fubo's history possible.

AMC Networks led the roughly $75 million Series D in April 2018, joined by 21st Century Fox and existing investors. That is worth pausing on. Fox was a Fubo shareholder years before it became a defendant in Fubo's antitrust suit over Venu Sports. Programmers investing in distributors is common in television, and it cuts both ways: the investor gains a distribution channel, and the distributor gains a shareholder who also sets its content costs.

Luminari Capital, founded by Daniel Leff, was another early backer, and Leff is the one investor from that era still visible in the structure. He serves as lead independent director on Fubo's board today. Sky and Scripps Networks Interactive also appear among the pre-2020 investor group, and ViacomCBS, now Paramount, held an undisclosed stake tied to a carriage agreement. None of these positions carries control. The Class B issuance made every legacy holding a minority slice of the 30% Class A pool.

Fubo is consolidated as an affiliate of Disney rather than run as an internal division, and the commercial relationship between the two runs through the financial statements in an unusual way. A large majority of Fubo's reported revenue is booked as related-party revenue, reflecting the wholesale arrangement under which Hulu + Live TV subscribers are served. In the March 2026 quarter, related-party revenue was $1.12 billion of $1.57 billion in total revenue.

Fubo's reported results are therefore partly a function of how Disney prices that arrangement, not only of how many customers Fubo wins. Public shareholders own a 30% claim on a business whose largest revenue line and largest cost line both run through its controlling shareholder. Disney has also taken over advertising sales for the combined company. The market has priced this cautiously: Fubo's Class A shares traded around $9 to $10 in mid-2026, down roughly 70% for the year to date, valuing the roughly 108 million Class A and Class B shares combined at close to $1 billion.

The person who runs Fubo today came from Disney. Alisa Bowen became chief executive on July 10, 2026, succeeding co-founder David Gandler. Bowen spent nearly a decade at Disney, most recently as president of Disney+, and was a founding member of the company's streaming leadership team with responsibility across Disney+, Hulu, and ESPN+. Before Disney she held roles at News Corporation, Dow Jones, and Thomson Reuters.

Gandler's exit was not a gradual handover. Under his employment agreement he resigned from the board and did not stand for re-election at the July 2026 annual meeting. He had co-founded the company in 2015 and led it for eleven years. Less than nine months separated the closing of the Disney deal from the removal of the founder who negotiated it.

The board reflects the same balance of power. Andy Bird, former chairman of Walt Disney International and former chief executive of Pearson, serves as independent chairman, and Daniel Leff of Waverley Capital is lead independent director. Four sitting Disney executives hold seats: Cathleen Taff, Debra OConnell, Jim Lygopoulos, and Justin Warbrooke, who between them run theatrical distribution, Disney Entertainment Television, people and culture, and corporate development. A fifth director, Jonathan S. Headley, is listed as independent and spent nearly 30 years at Disney, most recently as treasurer. Ignacio Figueras, the professional polo player and entrepreneur, holds the remaining independent seat.

The rest of the executive team mixes holdovers and outside hires. Co-founder Alberto Horihuela is chief operating officer, John Janedis, a former Wolfe Research media analyst, is chief financial officer, and Gina DiGioia is chief legal officer.

What is confirmed: Disney holds 70% of the votes, four board seats, and the chief executive appointment. What is inferred, because neither company discloses it, is how much operating latitude Fubo's management retains on pricing, packaging, and carriage decisions that touch Disney's own networks.

Fubo's ownership traces directly to litigation it started. In February 2024 it sued Disney, Fox, and Warner Bros. Discovery over Venu Sports, the sports streaming joint venture the three planned to launch together. Fubo's argument was that the three companies were bundling their sports rights into a slim, cheap package for themselves while forcing distributors like Fubo to carry expensive general entertainment channels to get the same games.

In August 2024 a federal judge in New York granted a preliminary injunction blocking Venu from launching. That was an unambiguous win for a company that had spent years complaining about programmer leverage. Five months later, in January 2025, Fubo settled: the three defendants agreed to pay $220 million, Disney agreed to a carriage deal and a $145 million term loan, and Disney agreed to merge Hulu + Live TV into Fubo in exchange for about 70% of the combined company. Four days after that announcement, the Venu partners abandoned the venture entirely.

The obvious criticism is that the plaintiff was bought. Fubo argued in court that Disney's market power harmed competition, then handed Disney control. Rival distributors and commentators made that point immediately, noting that the outcome removed both Venu and an independent Fubo in one transaction.

In February 2025, Senator Elizabeth Warren wrote to the Justice Department's antitrust division urging scrutiny of the deal. Her letter argued the acquisition would give Disney greater market power over sports distribution and create incentives to raise costs for viewers, and pointed out that the transaction resolved an antitrust suit against Disney itself.

The Justice Department completed its review and closed it without a challenge, allowing the deal to close on October 29, 2025. No conditions or remedies were publicly imposed. The combined company became the sixth largest pay television provider in the United States, competing chiefly against traditional cable operators and against YouTube TV, whose parent's economics are covered in who owns YouTube.

Ownership did not end Fubo's fights with programmers. In November 2025, weeks after the Disney deal closed, NBCUniversal pulled its channels from Fubo. Fubo said NBCU was demanding pricing and packaging terms far above what other distributors received, and that NBCU refused to let Peacock integrate into Fubo's app store while permitting the same integration for YouTube TV and Amazon Prime Video. NBCUniversal said Fubo had rejected terms accepted by hundreds of other distributors. The channels stayed dark until a distribution agreement was announced in June 2026, and Fubo raised prices during the period when they were only partially restored. Peacock's place in that fight reflects the strategy described in who owns Peacock.

The Class B structure leaves public holders in a weak position. They own about 30% of the equity, cannot outvote Disney on any matter, and hold shares in a company whose largest revenue and cost lines flow through its controlling shareholder. The 1-for-12 reverse split in March 2026 was a mechanical response to a depressed share price rather than a change in fundamentals, and the stock fell further after it took effect. Nothing here is unlawful, and controlled companies with dual-class stock are common. The point is that the protections minority holders normally rely on, board independence and the threat of a proxy contest, do not function the same way when one holder controls 70% of the votes and appoints the chief executive.

For Fubo, Disney's ownership solved the problem the company had spent a decade failing to solve. As an independent vMVPD, Fubo bought channels at a scale disadvantage and resold them at thin or negative margin. Combining with Hulu + Live TV roughly quadrupled its subscriber base and gave it the volume to negotiate differently. The company moved from consistent losses to positive adjusted EBITDA, raised its fiscal 2026 guidance to between $90 million and $100 million, and reaffirmed a target of at least $300 million by fiscal 2028. That turnaround is real, and it is a function of ownership.

For Disney, the deal did several things at once. It ended an antitrust suit, retired the Venu problem, moved a loss-making live television business off the parent's direct books into a separately listed vehicle, and consolidated two of the largest virtual pay television services under one roof. It also kept the on-demand Hulu library, the genuinely valuable asset, entirely within Disney. Streaming rivals face the same trade-off between owning distribution and licensing it, a tension visible in how Netflix makes money and in the free ad-supported model behind who owns Tubi.

For investors in the Class A stock, the calculation is uncomfortable. They hold a minority claim on a business that is finally approaching profitability, alongside a controlling shareholder that is also the company's largest supplier, its advertising sales agent, its lender, and the appointer of its chief executive. Every one of those relationships is a place where value can be allocated between parent and affiliate. The share price since closing suggests the market is discounting that risk rather than ignoring it.

For subscribers, ownership determines what happens to two apps that now answer to the same owner. Disney and Fubo have said both services will keep their own brands and pricing, the standard commitment after a merger of competing products. The NBCUniversal blackout showed the more immediate effect: when a distributor's owner is also one of the largest programmers in the country, disputes with rival programmers become harder to read as ordinary commercial negotiations.

The Walt Disney Company owns approximately 70% of FuboTV Inc. through its Hulu subsidiary, which holds Class B common stock carrying 70% of the voting power. The remaining roughly 30% is held by public shareholders through Class A common stock. Disney's stake closed on October 29, 2025, when Fubo's business combined with Disney's Hulu + Live TV.

Yes. FuboTV Inc. trades on the New York Stock Exchange under the ticker FUBO and continues to file public reports. It completed a 1-for-12 reverse stock split in March 2026, leaving roughly 29.4 million Class A shares and 79.0 million Class B shares outstanding. Because Disney controls 70% of the votes, public holders cannot outvote the parent.

Fubo was founded in 2015 by David Gandler, Alberto Horihuela, and Sung Ho Choi as a soccer streaming service. Gandler served as chief executive for eleven years. Alisa Bowen, a nearly decade-long Disney executive and former president of Disney+, became chief executive on July 10, 2026, and Gandler resigned from the board. Horihuela remains chief operating officer.

Fubo raised roughly $150 million in reported venture funding before going public, including a Series C of about $55 million led by Northzone in 2017 and a Series D of about $75 million led by AMC Networks in 2018, with 21st Century Fox participating. It then raised about $183 million in a New York Stock Exchange offering in October 2020.

Fubo sued Disney, Fox, and Warner Bros. Discovery in February 2024 over the Venu Sports joint venture, arguing the three were bundling sports rights for themselves on terms unavailable to distributors. A judge blocked Venu's launch in August 2024. In January 2025 Fubo settled for a $220 million payment from the three companies, a $145 million Disney term loan, a carriage agreement, and a combination that gave Disney about 70% of Fubo. The Venu partners abandoned the venture days later.

FuboTV Inc. reported 5.75 million paid North American subscribers for its third fiscal quarter of 2026, ended in June, up 2% year over year, plus 356,000 international subscribers through Molotov. That covers both the Fubo app and Hulu + Live TV, and compares with a peak of 6.2 million in the December 2025 quarter.