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Stephan Schmitter wants RTL and Sky to stop producing the same Formula 1 race twice. According to DWDL’s account of his appearance on Der Standard’s CEO podcast, the RTL Deutschland CEO plans a shared production for the two German broadcasters beginning in 2027, the final season of Sky’s current German rights contract, with its next agreement still to be decided.
I want Apple to go global with F1, and Germany is where I’d start. I’ve suspected Apple could go outside the US, and believe they should. In fact, if things work out well in the USA, I could see there being a case for some level of Apple broadcast globally.
Eddy Cue has a credible case for making the sport easier to follow across a full weekend. The German deal should also keep races on free television, where someone can become interested before deciding whether to pay.
Motorsport-Magazin named Apple in July, after Stefano Domenicali said the tender for rights beginning in 2028 had more than one interested operator. BILD named Apple again in September. Neither Apple nor F1 has announced a German agreement.
RTL can cut costs while keeping a route into F1
Schmitter has sound reasons to combine the crews. RTL completed its purchase of Sky Deutschland on June 1, bringing together businesses with around 12.3 million paying subscribers. RTL is targeting approximately $280 million in annual savings within three years, mostly from cost reductions.
Sending two teams to cover the same race is an obvious expense to examine after buying the company next door, especially if Schmitter can preserve good reporting and commentary while freeing money for other work, although we haven’t seen which presenters or commentators would remain.
Digital Fernsehen points out that Sky’s race coverage is ad-free while RTL interrupts for commercials, so a shared production will have to keep the paid coverage running through those breaks if you’re following a pit-stop sequence on Sky.
Schmitter already has free television, a subscription business, and German commentary teams viewers know, which lets him introduce a race on RTL and sell the full season through Sky without first teaching people who’s covering the sport. Apple will need German voices.
But F1 faces a larger problem. Until 2020, RTL carried every race live on free television. Sky became the exclusive rights holder in 2021, with selected races subsequently returning to RTL.
That makes RTL’s free channel an asset a new rights holder should consider keeping in the arrangement. Apple could buy the full-season rights and sublicense selected races. RTL would still have something to sell advertisers, and Cue would have a place to introduce the paid coverage to people outside its subscription service.
Apple’s US coverage offers more than a new destination
Under the five-year US agreement that began in 2026, you get every practice, qualifying session, sprint and Grand Prix inside an Apple TV subscription, with all practice sessions and selected races free in the app, while subscribers also get F1 TV Premium and can keep using F1’s own service.
If you already subscribe to Apple TV, you get the season without buying a separate sports pass. If you subscribe to F1, you also get Apple’s shows and films. The current US monthly price is $14.99; no German F1 package has been announced.
At the Paley Center in New York on September 24, I asked Cue why Apple would work with competitors, after Apple had allowed Netflix to carry the Canadian Grand Prix for US viewers alongside its own coverage and Tubi to carry creator-hosted broadcasts of selected races. He said, “Because I care about growing F1, first and foremost.”
Those arrangements give Apple ways to reach someone who hasn’t decided F1 deserves another monthly charge. They also leave room for a German free-TV partner. Cue has already shown he can share selected races while holding the full-season rights.
At Chelsea Studios in New York on October 6, Apple and Dolby let me hear F1 in Dolby Atmos, and an engine passing through the room made me want to hear how that sound would carry a full live race weekend on my own equipment. The US debut is scheduled for the Grand Prix weekend beginning October 23.
I was convinced. It gave me a reason to look forward to the next broadcast, including the stretches when the running order barely changes. You’ll need compatible equipment to hear the full effect at home, and a preview can’t tell us how many people will renew a subscription.
Cue told me at Paley that race-day viewing was up by a double-digit percentage, with a younger audience and more women. Apple hasn’t published comparable race averages.
USA TODAY’s Jared Beilby reported Samba estimates showing lower US household TV reach year over year for eight of nine races analyzed, including declines of 68% for Miami and 66% for Monaco, two races that had aired on ABC in 2025 and therefore had a broad free-TV audience to compare against. Samba measures household TV reach using smart-TV data, which covers part of Apple’s audience and differs from Nielsen’s average audience measure.
Domenicali told USA TODAY that total hours watched were up 13%. Samba also found more minutes watched per household for Australia and Monaco. A smaller TV audience can watch for longer, and viewers can move to other devices. We need comparable measures to know how much of each is happening.
A global F1 service would grow one contract at a time
Cue has said he wants to expand. In Miami on May 1, he told Reuters, “Do I hope that we are able to grow into other areas and markets? Yeah, I do.” He also acknowledged that F1 licenses rights by territory.
Five days later, Domenicali and Sky agreed to extend the UK and Ireland partnership through 2034 and Italy through 2032, leaving any ambition to make Apple the worldwide home of live F1 dependent on contracts that will keep three countries with another broadcaster well into the next decade.
Germany would let Cue build a second version of the service while those agreements continue. The same technical work could support several markets, with local commentary and different free-TV arrangements. A fan could learn the same app in each country where Apple holds the rights, even as the contracts and prices differ.
Domenicali has already explained why he approaches expansion cautiously. He told Motorsport.com that each country has different needs and described the US as the most mature market for streaming. Germany would test how far Apple’s approach travels, particularly among viewers accustomed to getting F1 for free.
I don’t think Cue needs to wait for every territory to become available. He can start in Germany, build coverage with an audience that understands the sport, and let viewers watch the full weekend in the subscription while giving RTL enough free races to introduce the sport to someone who hasn’t considered paying to watch Hülkenberg.
Domenicali should put a free-TV sublicense into the German agreement, so Apple pays for a chance to win back the people who stopped watching when RTL lost the full season.
Business of Speed covers the business, technology, and lifestyle of racing: Formula 1, IndyCar, IMSA, WEC, NASCAR, and more. From Vincenzo Landino, entrepreneur and creator, featured in Bloomberg, TBPN, Yahoo! Finance, Forbes, Adweek, and Front Office Sports. You can find us on Instagram, Substack, and LinkedIn.
