Wednesday, 21st November 2007
SPORTS SHORTS
* The Chinese city of Hangzhou is to stage the first major new women’s squash tournament of the 2008 season. The Women’s International Squash Players’ Association has announced that the tournament will be a WISPA Premiere Series event, meaning that the promoters will receive special advice and financial support from the governing body. The WISPA Hangzhou Open will take place at the squash hall of the Hangzhou Gymnasium from January 23 to 25 and offer $10,900 in prize money. The WISPA Premiere Series concept was launched at the recent Icelandair Group Classic in Reykjavik. Source: Sportcal, 20th Nov 2007
* ESPN, Nimbus and Sony have all expressed interest in acquiring the rights for Indian cricket’s Twenty20 Indian Premier League. The three broadcasters made presentations to the Board of Control for Cricket in India on their marketing plans ahead of the formal tender process which is expected to start at the end of the month. The winning bid is likely to be announced in the first week in December. Source: Sport Business, Sportcal, 20th Nov 2007
* Meanwhile, the backers of the Indian Cricket League, organisers of the unofficial Twenty20 competition in the north of the country, have claimed that the Board of Control for Cricket in India is still threatening players and stadium owners not to co-operate with the new venture. The BCCI has said it will ban players involved with the ICL, which is supported by Essel Group, the owner of media group Zee Telefilms, and take action against grounds which stage matches. However, ICL chief executive Ashish Kaul says it can operate perfectly well outside the auspices of the board, saying: ‘The BCCI itself is a private organisation. So are we. ICL is as recognised or unrecognised as the BCCI. We don’t need any recognition or money from the BCCI.’ Source: Sportcal, 20th Nov 2007
* The value of sport to television is set to increase as statistics show that its live nature means viewers are less likely to use digital video recorders to skip ad breaks. The Financial Times quotes US research by MediaVest showing that, in the last week of October, 25% of viewers watched Grey’s Anatomy on time shift, giving them opportunity to skip ads. In contrast fewer than 2% did so for sporting events. Sport is partly credited for enabling CBS, the US television network, to post double-digit increases in advertising revenues this year. Meanwhile, with two months to go until the NFL Super Bowl, rivals Fox have sold all but two advertising slots at prices as high as $2.7 million for 30-seconds of airtime. Source: Sportcal, 20th Nov 2007
* Sixteen-time Turkish champion Galatasaray SK has become the latest club to be added to the Superleague Formula grid ahead of its debut in August 2008. Galatasaray will take its place on a 20-strong grid in the new championship featuring 750 horsepower, V12-powered single seaters bearing colours of the world’s leading clubs. Launched in April this year, the championship will kick off in 2008 with an initial six races staged at major circuits across Europe. Three major club launches are scheduled for Flamengo in Rio de Janeiro (Brazil), RSC Anderlecht in Brussels (Belgium) and FC Basel (Switzerland) in the next three weeks. Additional club signings are set to be announced early in 2008. Source: Football Insider, 20th Nov 2007
* FC Barcelona has made further strides to reach out to its huge global fan base by becoming the first European football club to offer its official website in Arabic. The Primera División giant has also launched a Korean language version of FCBarcelona.com, ensuring that the site can now be accessed in seven different languages. “Having the website in seven languages is a remarkable feat and pioneering in the world of football,” said Marc Ingla, Barcelona’s vice-president of marketing and media. The launch is the result of an agreement with LinkDotNet, which was officially unveiled during Barcelona’s trip to the Egyptian city of Cairo for a friendly on April 24. Source: Sports Media, 20th Nov 2007
* A1 GP World Cup of Motorsport’s Team Malaysia agreed a deal with Sime Darby Berhad as a new sponsor of the team for this weekend’s home event at the Sepang International Circuit in Kuala Lumpur. The Sime Darby group is a leading Malaysian multinational and one of Southeast Asia's largest conglomerates. Under the deal, Sime Darby branding and logos will be shown on the A1 Team Malaysia car and driver suits. Source: Sport Business, 20th Nov 2007
MORE NEWS
Japan/New Media: LIVESPORTS.JP Announces Launch of Sports Streaming Portal
LIVESPORTS, the new LIVE sports streaming portal site, announced today that it has launched its activity with the most prestigious sports content for the Japanese market. Content will include SERIE A (Italian Soccer League) with both LIVE and Video-On-Demand content, as well as CELTIC GLASGOW (Scottish Premier League Team where Shunsuke Nakamura plays) and, all of the matches of the ENGLISH PREMIER LEAGUE on a VOD basis.
LIVESPORTS will allow Japanese viewers to watch international and Japanese sporting events, and will stream a wide range of sports including motor sports, winter sports and even extreme sports content.
Broadband penetration in Japan is amongst the best in the world, with over 27 million homes already wired and continuing to grow. LIVESPORTS combines the simplicity, immediacy and visual quality of traditional television with interactivity, flexibility, and far reach of broadband internet usage. Consumers have access to a potentially unlimited range of top tier sports action programs, being accessible wherever and whenever they wish to view it.
LIVESPORTS’s innovative distribution technology combines both peer-to-peer (P2P) and CDN (Content Distribution Network) capabilities enabling high resolution (1-1.5M bps) and immersive content to be distributed nationwide, to anyone with a broadband internet connection across Japan.
LIVESPORTS enables all the sports fans’ dreams to come true. They can watch premium, highly-valued LIVE sports action at television-quality definition, wherever and whenever consumers have a broadband internet connection. In Japan, this means almost everywhere,” said Andrea Radrizzani, CEO LIVESPORTS Pte. “This will also be the first time that top-class European football is available LIVE and on-demand to the public in Japan through the internet.” Source: Sports e-Media, Sportcal, 20th Nov 2007
Elsewhere/Rights: Sky Italia Makes Offer to End Serie B TV Dispute
Sky Italia, the Italian pay-television broadcaster, has made a proposal to Italian’s soccer second-tier Serie B aimed at ending a lengthy dispute over coverage of the league. The 20 Serie B clubs received an offer yesterday from Sky Italia for the rights to all games. There is no fee involved, with the clubs instead receiving 95% of the money generated by Sky Italia from selling the games on a pay-per-view basis for €5 ($7.39) each. Without a television deal in place, Serie B clubs’ combined debts have been estimated at around €150 million.
In October, the clubs protested at the lack of live television coverage by deciding to prevent crews from entering their stadiums. The clubs also voiced their discontent about the high rights fees being paid to Serie A clubs and the amount that Rai, the Italian public service broadcaster, is spending on international soccer.
Rai and Sky Italia had both failed to meet the asking price set for Serie B rights. Rai had sought to fund a bid for the rights by sublicensing Euro 2008 rights for selected matches to Sky Italia, if Italy qualified for the international tournament. Serie B clubs have recently threatened to halt the league following new proposals for distributing future Serie A rights, which would net the top division €795 million a season, around eight times the €105 million on offer to Serie B. Source: Sportcal, 20th Nov 2007
Elsewhere/New Media: ITTF Still Searching for the Right Internet Strategy
The International Table Tennis Federation has handed ZIM, the internet television broadcaster, an ultimatum to produce satisfactory internet coverage of the Pro Tour Grand Finals in Beijing on December 13 to 16, or lose the contract. ZIM was appointed at the beginning of the year by the ITTF and TMS International, its marketing arm, to offer live and archived coverage of the Pro Tour and World Junior Tour series, but is yet to convince the federation of the reliability of its coverage, according to Jordi Serra, the ITTF’s executive director. Serra told Sportcal.com: ‘The Grand Finals in Beijing will be the last chance for ZIM to show us what they can do.’
He said that the ITTF was still undertaking a ‘trial period’ for internet coverage and looking at what different companies can offer, as it ‘needs to be sure which technologies are reliable and be clear as to what the live production costs are for internet coverage.’ Christian Veronese, event marketing manager of TMS International, said: ‘We are still trying to give a chance to three different companies including ZIM, to webcast the ITTF events. ZIM will have the exclusive rights for live webcast at the next Grand Finals in Beijing.’ The other two internet service providers are the German companies Contenthouse and TTLive.
Serra described the internet as an ‘important new communication tool for sports like us and the ITTF must be there,’ adding that, ‘we are not making money from it but we are not spending much money either.’ He said, ‘At the beginning there were [internet] companies offering lots of money to international federations, but now the money is not so big and organisations are going bankrupt.’ The ITTF official website last week began broadcasting replays of games in full, although there have been some problems synchronizing the sound with the pictures. ZIM and the ITTF had originally planned to offer free live and replay coverage of competitions in 2007 and then introduce a subscription model from 2008. Source: Sportcal, 20th Nov 2007
Tuesday, 20th November 2007
SPORTS SHORTS
* CCTV, the Chinese state broadcaster, has attracted Yn80 billion ($10.7 billion) in an auction of its advertising slots for next year, with 30 per cent more companies bidding for slots as a result of next year's Olympic Games. The figure represents a 20% on this year's advertising slots auction, with peak-time slots during the games in August the most popular. Source: Sportcal, 19th Nov 2007
* Golf’s European Tour is to stage the game’s richest ever tournament worth $20 million in Dubai in 2009. According to UK media reports the event will have a total prize pot of $10 million, with a further $10 million to be divided as bonus money among the highest-ranked players at the end of the 2009 season. Further details will be announced in Dubai later this month. The tournament will be backed by the government of Dubai as part of its wider plans to establish itself as the world's premier tourist destination. Source: Sport Business, Sportcal, 19th Nov 2007
* Red Bee Media, formerly BBC Broadcast, has opened an office in Singapore. The office opening follows establishing branches in France, China and Australia. Red Bee has worked with broadcasters in the Asia region, including i-Cable Hong Kong, ATV, Jupiter Entertainment, INX Media, ESPN and STAR. The new operation in Singapore will be working on interactive design, media management, branding, promotional and editorial service projects. Running the Singapore office will be Petri Nikula, vice president of business development. Nikula has worked in media and marketing for 12 years with Microsoft, VoiceAge Networks and Nokia, in the Americas and Europe, as well as Asia. Source: Rapid TV News, 19th Nov 2007
* GigaMedia Limited has secured an exclusive licence from Electronic Arts (EA) - a leading developer and publisher of interactive entertainment - to offer and operate the new sports game NBA Street Online in Taiwan, Hong Kong and Macau. NBA Street Online is a new version of EA's popular NBA games series, which features some of the world’s top basketball stars. “Sports games are a huge, untapped market in Asia, and EA is a sports superstar,” said GigaMedia CEO Arthur Wang. EA Asia president Jon Niermann added: “Basketball is the No.1 sport in Taiwan and we are confident of continued great success in the sport with NBA Street Online.” Source: Sports Media, 19th Nov 2007
* The French football league, the LFP, is expected to launch its TV rights tender in the first week of December, with a deal likely to be agreed in January or February. The league is awaiting final permission to sell its rights for a four-year term from the French competition authority. The LFP sought to have its contracts extended from three to four years, with 12 packages. Source: Sport Business, 19th Nov 2007
* IMG has been told by the International Olympic Committee that it is no longer eligible to act as an adviser to Olympic bid cities, because of concerns over possible conflicts of interest. The IOC’s ethics commission has ruled that IMG’s existing role as a consultant to the IOC on other issues, including television rights, gives the agency privileged access to IOC members which they could use to lobby the members on behalf of a bid city. While there is no suggestion that access has been abused in this way, it is understood that the IOC wants to rule out such a possibility. The IOC has received no complaints on IMG, raising the question as to why it has decided to take such a step. One possibility, according to one observer, is that the agency might be about to be handed a far greater role in advising the IOC on other issues. Source: Sportcal, 19th Nov 2007
* Pan-European motor sports channel, Motors TV, is expanding its coverage of Australia’s V8 Supercars after signing a new three-year deal to televise the series. In the new agreement, which runs until 2010, Motors TV will show races on a live and delayed basis, while offering more coverage of qualifying at certain rounds. Motors TV will broadcast races in five different languages to 15 million homes in 36 countries. V8 Supercars Australia chairman Tony Cochrane said: ‘We are very proud of our international television audience and Motors TV is an integral part of it within the European market. This helps maintain our international television footprint of 850 million homes worldwide that broadcast our sport.’ Source: Sportcal, 19th Nov 2997
* Flamengo has announced the launch of its online TV station in two weeks’ time. The Brazilian giant is expecting to attract around 500,000 subscribers, with FlaTV featuring player interviews, footage from behind the scenes at the club, and live coverage of training sessions. Club vice-president, Kleber Leite, is optimistic about the new revenue streams the channel can potentially open up. “We look to collect R5 million (US$2.85 million) from the service (in the first year). 75% of that amount will be reinvested in the clubs, with another 15% going towards player costs. Computers are selling at twice the rate of televisions in Brazil and who knows, we might even have one million subscribers soon.” Source: Football Insider, 19th Nov 2007
* The www.uefa.com website is offering live coverage of 14 of the 16 games at the ongoing UEFA European Futsal Championship in Portugal. Spain, Portugal, Russia, Italy, Ukraine, Serbia, Czech Republic and Romania are participating at the event. There is also TV coverage of the competition from Eurosport and other UEFA broadcast partners. Live streaming is available on a free-to-view basis in some territories, including Asia. Full subscribers to uefa.com's premium video service (uefa.com/video) are also able to access extensive delayed coverage including in-match event clips, full match re-runs and 10-minute highlights from every game. Source: Sports Media, 19th Nov 2007
* ITV has sold to Manchester United its one-third share in the club's television channel, MUTV, for £3.3 million. Tom Betts, commercial and acquisitions director at Britain’s largest free-to-air broadcaster, said the move represented “ITV's ongoing non-core asset disposal programme”. The Barclays Premier League champion now owns two-thirds of MUTV. Satellite pay-TV company BSkyB owns the other third. Earlier this year, ITV offloaded its stakes in United’s English rivals Arsenal and Liverpool for a combined total of around £82 million. Source: Sports Media, Sport Business, Sportcal, 19th Nov 2007
* Athens, Bangkok, Moscow, Singapore and Turin were selected by the International Olympic Committee as the candidate cities to host the first Youth Olympic Games in 2010. Excluded from the shortlist were Debrecen, Guatemala City, Kuala Lumpur and Poznan. A further cut could take place in late January next year before IOC members decide which city will stage the games through a postal vote in February, 2008. The selection this time round was made on the basis of the cities’ candidature files submitted to the IOC last month. An evaluation commission visit to the cities will follow. Source: Sportcal, 19th Nov 2007
MORE NEWS
Elsewhere/Rights: DFL Undersold Bundesliga Rights to Kirch, Says Sportfive
The German Football League is guilty of underselling its broadcast rights to Leo Kirch, the reborn media entrepreneur, according to Thomas Röttgermann, managing director of the German arm of international sports marketing giant Sportfive. Röttgermann criticised the DFL’s six-year, €3-billion ($4.4-billion) deal with Kirch for the production and domestic distribution rights of the top-tier Bundesliga, claiming that the league could have generated more income.
He told Germany’s Die Welt newspaper, ‘If you ask me, I think that the Bundesliga rights are worth more. ‘If I had been in the shoes of the DFL’s chief executive Christian Seifert, I would have been gutsier. ‘Leo Kirch also appears to consider the rights to be worth more, or else he wouldn’t have done the deal.’
Röttgermann, who also said that Sportfive ‘would love to market the Bundesliga rights,’ claimed to be surprised that the league opted to hand the distribution rights to Kirch without a tender. He said: ‘You should not forget that Kirch plunged the league into an existence-threatening crisis, for which a solution would scarcely have been found without the help of politicians.’
The collapse in 2002 of Kirch’s media group KirchMedia, which held the Bundesliga rights at the time, was the most spectacular in German broadcasting history and left clubs facing large debts. Sirius, the production and distribution partnership set up by the DFL and Kirch, is to begin marketing the domestic rights from 2009-10 onwards at the beginning of next year. Kirch’s €500-million-a-year deal with the DFL represents a rise of around €80 million a year on the value of the domestic rights. Source: Sportcal, 19th Nov 2007
Elsewhere/General: Garber Hails Beckham Impact On Viewing Figures
Major League Soccer (MLS) commissioner Dan Garber insists David Beckham has had a major impact on television ratings in 2007. Beckham, who switched to the Los Angeles Galaxy franchise earlier this year, has only played five matches in MLS because of a series of injuries. However, Garber is happy with the England player’s contribution so far.
“The Chicago Fire versus LA Galaxy game - the last one of the regular season - which was aired by Telefutura, had 400,000 households watching that game,” said Garber in the New York Times. “That is three times the typical Telefutura rating for an MLS game. We did similar numbers for ESPN games when David was in the conversation. Our ratings on ESPN and Telefutura have nearly doubled when David is playing in a game.” International television sales have also been boosted by Beckham’s arrival, Garber added. “International TV sales have gone up from next to nothing to distribution in 100 countries, with live games in Asia and Mexico. Our fan following in England, Italy, Spain, Mexico and Canada has grown exponentially.”
Garber added: “Every measure of our business has grown because of him, from our gate to our merchandise to our television sponsors and corporate sponsors. We have sold more than 300,000 Beckham Galaxy jerseys - 700 times the number of Galaxy jersey sold in 2007. A player who is a global icon in sports made a statement to spend the rest of his career in MLS. The statement alone has given us credibility.” Source: Sports Media, 19th Nov 2007
Monday, 19th November 2007
SPORTS SHORTS
* The inaugural Singapore Grand Prix has secured SingTel, the country’s largest telecommunications group, as its title sponsor. The event, which takes place on September 28, 2008, will be known as the ‘Formula 1 SingTel Singapore Grand Prix.’ Further details of the sponsorship will be released at the beginning of next year. Formula 1 promoter Bernie Ecclestone described SingTel as ‘a powerful player in the world of telecommunications’ and said the deal would offer the company ‘the platform to achieve global recognition of their brand.’ The new street race will be Formula 1’s first-ever night grand prix. Source: Sportcal, 16th Nov 2007
* The International Basketball Federation (FIBA) hereby informs that two of its national federations, the Chinese Basketball Association and the Samahang Basketbol ng Pilipinas, have presented bids to organize the 2008 Diamond Ball for Men. The FIBA Central Board, which will meet in Chicago (USA) from 7th to 9th December 2007, will decide which one of these two countries will be entrusted with the organization of this six-team invitational tournament scheduled to take place from 29th July to 1st August 2008 (eight days before the beginning of the Beijing Olympic Games). Source: Sports e-Media, Sportcal, 16th Nov 2007
* The Italian Soccer League has just inked a government-brokered deal that will change how the $1 billion per season local soccer TV rights will be split. Previously, Calcio rights were negotiated individually by team rather than collectively. That meant billionaire clubs got big bucks from broadcasters while smaller clubs were left with crumbs. Sports Minister Giovanna Melandri hailed the agreement as "a democratic revolution," noting that the Serie A suffered the highest TV coin disparity in Europe. While the league rights are now estimated to be worth €700,000 (US$1 billion) for a two-year season, in Blighty, BSkyB and Setanta Sports have paid more than five times that sum for a three-year Premiere League package. Source: Variety, 16th Nov 2007
* The English Rugby Football Union and Premier Rugby agreed a new deal which is hoped will put an end to club-v-country rows. The RFU will give the Premiership clubs £110 million in exchange for more time with elite players ahead of Test matches. Clubs will also have the right to sell their own TV and sponsorship rights. The deal runs from July 2008 to 2016. Premier Rugby chief executive Mark McCafferty said the part of the deal which allows the clubs to sell their own TV and media rights - was crucial. The agreement means that England players will be released from club commitments 13 or 14 days before autumn internationals, Six Nations matches or summer tours matches, giving them more preparation time. The deal should put an end to a dispute that has run intermittently since rugby union turned professional in 1995. Source: Sport Business, Sportcal, 16th Nov 2007
* Carson Yeung wants more time to complete his £50 million takeover of Birmingham City. The Hong Kong businessman has been given until December 20 by the current co-owner David Sullivan to buy the Barclays Premier League club. However, the Birmingham Mail claims Yeung, who bought a 29.9% stake in the club in July, wants to extend that deadline. It is understood Yeung and his associates are struggling to raise the appropriate funds. Sullivan has said there will be no extension which means Yeung could be forced to pull out of the proposed takeover. Source: Football Insider, 16th Nov 2007
* Walt Disney Group is said to be in talks to take over English Premier League club Derby County. According to UK press reports, Roy Disney, the company chairman is negotiating a deal for a consortium of financial institutions to take a controlling shareholding in the club. If any deal goes ahead, Derby would become the fourth club to be bought by American owners following in the footsteps of Manchester United, Liverpool and Aston Villa. Source: Sport Business, 16th Nov 2007
* A new website has launched offering fans a chance to access messages from some of their favourite sports stars. The www.bigredcarpet.com site allows visitors to receive greetings 'in person' from the likes of Ricky Hatton, Stephen Hendry, Younus Khan and Kenny Dalglish. The messages range from ‘happy birthday’ and ‘season’s greetings’ to ‘get the beers in’. Big Red Carpet’s site would be continually updated and there is an area for users to record and upload their own content so they can share it. Greetings are sent via WAP or email to consumers’ mobiles or PCs. Big Red Carpet is a non-subscription service, and customers are charged a one-off fee of £3.00 for video greetings. Source: Sports Media, 16th Nov 2007
MORE NEWS
Asia/General: City Makes Statement Of Intent With Raft Of Deals
Manchester City has illustrated its desire to secure a foothold in new commercial markets by unveiling a raft of new partnership deals. City has been busy securing a number of partnerships in the Far East this week, and as reported in yesterday’s Football Insider, the Barclays (sponsor) Premier League outfit has agreed a three-year link-up with leading internet and mobile rights provider Premier Goals to produce a Chinese language version of the club’s official website. City yesterday confirmed another three-year agreement with Singha Beer worth “seven figures”. As an official partner, the Asian beer will have stadium branding, advertising and promotional rights both in the UK and overseas, and will be on sale at the City of Manchester Stadium.
“Exceptional on-pitch performances have taken interest in the club to an unprecedented level around the world,” said City CEO Alistair Mackintosh. “This increased interest is most evident in Asia and specifically Thailand. Our partnership with Singha Beer opens up a range of new and exciting opportunities in key markets and provides a platform on which to interact with our rapidly growing supporter base outside of the UK.” City has also penned a strategic partnership with Chinese computer gaming company The9 Group. Part-owned by EA Sports, The9 is a major player in China's computer gaming market, and has the licence to market EA's 'FIFA Online' game in China. City chairman Thaksin Shinawatra said: “We believe that our partnership will help Manchester City become a major brand in the virtual world.”
City has this week additionally announced global alliances with Chinese Super League club Shanghai Shen Hua, as well as FC Moscow in Russia and Thanda Royal Zulu FC from Durban, South Africa. Thaksin told www.mcfc.co.uk: “My goals for the football team are ambitious - to secure Manchester City a position as one of the world’s biggest football brands. I intend to increase the club’s fan base by reaching out to Manchester City fans across the world, not least in Asia and specifically in China and my home nation of Thailand. I intend to deepen the links between the club and its international supporters. We are looking at now how best to link our fans through membership and other schemes. Our modest ambitions for City don’t end with domination of the world game, we want to be a major brand in the commercial world too.” Source: Football Insider, 16th Nov 2007
China/Broadcaster: New Deals for Chinese Digital TV
China Digital TV, a New York-listed, Beijing-based conditional access provider, signed 18 new deals with Chinese cable operators during the third quarter. In its first results as a publicly-traded company, China Digital TV saw profits for the quarter to end-September rise 53% on the same quarter the previous year to $8.8 million. Revenues rose 37.3% to $14.4 million, up 28.9% on the previous quarter.
China Digital TV accounts for some 45% of the Chinese digital CA market. Over 140 million homes in China subscribe to cable TV, but most are still analogue. However, the government has ruled that all analogue TV must be converted to digital by 2015. And a recent study from Media Partners Asia said its consultants expected around 84 million to have migrated to digital by 2010. At June 30, China Digital TV had installed CA systems at 130 network operators. And for the quarter to the end of September, the company shipped 1.9 million smart cards - 23.6% more than in the previous quarter.
However, while the company is attracting business and has a phenomenal operating margin (65% for Q3), its actual revenues are relatively low. China Digital TV expects revenues for the final quarter of 2007 to be between $15.5 million and $17.5 million. That said, those figures represent year-on-year growth of 61% to 82% so the potential for much greater revenues is there. Source: Rapid TV News, 16th Nov 2007
Elsewhere/Rights: Kentaro and Pitch International Grab FA Rights in Europe
Sports agencies Kentaro and Pitch International have occupied ground previously held by rivals Sportfive and CSI Sports after the Football Association, English soccer’s governing body, awarded European distribution rights from 2008-09 onwards. Sportfive has regained the rights in France and Germany to England’s home internationals and the FA Cup knockout competition, but lost contracts elsewhere after Kentaro and Pitch International, who bid jointly, concluded a four-year deal covering the rest of western Europe and Scandinavia. The Scandinavian rights are currently held by CSI Sports, the agency this year acquired by IMG Media, the media arm of the international sports agency IMG.
Kentaro, the Switzerland-based agency, already holds the broadcast distribution rights for the home matches of a selection of international teams in Europe, including the Republic of Ireland, Norway and Sweden. Meanwhile Pitch International, the sport rights agency founded by former senior executives at Octagon CSI, has the rights for Germany’s home Euro 2008 qualifiers in the United Kindgom, Republic of Ireland, the Middle East, Africa, and the Americas. Pitch also represents the broadcast rights of the DBU, the Danish Football Association.
It was confirmed earlier this week that the UK-based agency AMI is to handle the FA's rights in 16 central and eastern European countries, including Russia, Ukraine, Poland, Hungary, Romania, the Czech Republic, Slovakia and the Balkan territories. The FA also announced today a new four-year deal with GO, the quadruple-play telecommunications operator in Malta. The various agreements with agencies and some direct deals with broadcasters have helped the FA secure more than £145 million ($296.2 million) from international rights in the period from 2008 to 2012. This is a 275-per-cent increase on the £38.5 million generated last time round. Source: Sportcal, 16th Nov 2007
ARTICLES, COMMENTS & OPINIONS
21st Century Sport: New World Order
Brian Oliver Blogs on The Guardian Unlimited UK, 18th Nov 2007
The event that sparked The Observer's '21st Century Sport' series was the match at Wembley between the Miami Dolphins and the New York Giants on 28 October, the first competitive, regular-season NFL game to be played in Europe.
On the same weekend, Manchester United, at the invitation of an Indian billionaire, were staging a training programme in Goa, run by their academy director Brian McClair. Today, as our series draws to a close, Chelsea are in India. Their team of chief executive Peter Kenyon, media director Simon Greenberg, former player Graeme Le Saux and famous fan Lord Coe are part of London Mayor Ken Livingstone's ambassadorial team promoting London and 'creating closer ties between the capital and India in business, tourism, education, sport and creative industries'.
Which has the better chance of reaching out to a new market in the next decade: American football in Europe, or English football in the subcontinent? Or maybe neither - perhaps the big mover will be Major League Baseball, which has just announced that the season-opening series next March, between the Boston Red Sox and Oakland Athletics, will be played in Tokyo. It will be the third time since 2000 that the MLB season has begun in the Japanese capital.
The world of sport, as we have been saying, is changing. So fast that we are in the middle - or end, or beginning, depending on your viewpoint - of the most important period of upheaval since the latter decades of the 19th century, when rules were made, leagues formed, players paid to perform and paying spectators turned up in large numbers week after week.
Dick Holt, an expert on Victorian sport who teaches at De Montfort University, says one of the biggest changes in the late 19th century was 'the emergence of a specialist sports press and a daily sports page for a new mass, urban, readership. Before radio in the 1930s, this was the only way to follow sport if you were not actually present'.
The key structural changes were in the Football League (formed in 1888), both codes of rugby and county cricket. 'These provided the basis for the 20th-century system of professional, but not commercial sport, largely still run by amateurs. They did not see team games as a commodity subject to the forces of the free market.
'In striking contrast to baseball in the United States, which was begun as a business by Spalding, a sports-goods manufacturer, county members subsidised their cricket teams and directors of professional football clubs were limited to small returns on their investments. Most of them lost their money. Profit-maximising never occurred to them. Tickets were cheap, advertising was almost non-existent and no one thought of hiring out the facilities for anything but sport. It was another world and one which lasted more or less unchanged until the advent of television.'
Now, we are in the post-television world. Within a few years, and with a lot of help from Asia, the Premier League, or the EPL as outsiders prefer it, could leapfrog the three ahead of it in the world league of leagues, all of them American: the NFL, Major League Baseball and the National Basketball Association. 'We should be able to overtake one or two,' says the League's chief executive Richard Scudamore, which is strong stuff given that he does not, as he tells Observer Sport time and again, like to make predictions. Continues…
Friday, 16th November 2007
SPORTS SHORTS
* The Brazilian agency Traffic Sports Marketing has become the latest company to be awarded media rights to major matches organised by the Football Association, English soccer’s governing body. Traffic has acquired exclusive rights to England’s home games and the FA Cup knockout competition in 21 territories in Latin America and will now seek to stimulate demand for the properties in the region. The deal covers a four-year period, beginning with the 2008-09 season. Source: Sportcal, 15th Nov 2007
* Running up to Asia Television Forum (ATF), Rive Gauche Television has closed several key broadcast sales in Asia for its reality and documentary programs. AXN Asia picked up rights to season one of Video Zonkers and season two of Whacked Out Sports. Whacked Out Sports also picked up sales in Indonesia, where Lativi secured the free-TV rights for second season. In China, Phoenix Satellite TV acquired The Great Warming for cable and satellite broadcast, while Red Seal Media picked up the free-TV broadcast rights to Destination Future. Elsewhere, in Thailand, True Corp/UBC secured first two seasons of Lisa Williams: Life Among the Dead and fourth season of Dog Whisperer, for C&S. Source: Worldscreen, Variety, 15th Nov 2007
* MLB’s Boston Red Sox will begin the defence of their World Series title with a two-game series against the Oakland Athletics in Japan next March. The games will be played at the Tokyo Dome on March 25 and 26 and mark the third time that MLB will begin the season in the Japanese capital. The New York Mets and the Chicago Cubs were the first regular season visitors to Tokyo in 2000 and the New York Yankees took on the Tampa Bay Devil Rays there in 2004. The visit of the Red Sox is bound to stir up considerable interest as it will mark the return of pitchers Daisuke Matsuzaka and Hideki Okajima to their homeland. Meanwhile, MLB is in negotiations with the Chinese authorities to stage two exhibition games between the Los Angeles Dodgers and the San Diego Padres in Beijing on March 15 and 16 as the city continues the build-up to the 2008 Olympic Games. Source: Sportcal, 15th Nov 2007
* Manchester City Football Club agreed a deal with Singha Beer as the club’s Official Premium Beer. The deal makes Singha the latest addition to Manchester City’s growing family of official partners and the three-year, seven figure agreement, brings together two organisations with ambitions to grow their respective businesses internationally. As the Official Premium Beer of Manchester City, Singha Beer will benefit from extensive stadium branding, advertising and promotional rights both in the UK and overseas. In addition, Singha Beer will be on sale at the City of Manchester Stadium providing supporters with the opportunity to sample one of Asia’s most popular beers on match days. Source: Sport Business, 15th Nov 2007
* Chelsea has been invited to join the Mayor of London Ken Livingstone and his delegation of other London Ambassadors on his visit to India that starts this coming Sunday. The trip will promote closer ties between the capital and India in business, tourism, education, sport and creative industries. Chelsea CEO Peter Kenyon, who will lead the club's contingent, said: “We were in China 18 months ago with the Mayor's delegation then and we are delighted to have been asked again. Chelsea will be participating in a conference in Delhi called Host Cities: Unlocking Business Opportunities through Sporting Events, as part of Delhi's build up to the 2010 Commonwealth Games. Source: Football Insider, 15th Nov 2007
* Northern Ireland fans unable to travel to Gran Canaria for next Wednesday's final Euro 2008 qualifier against Spain are facing a television black out. Four thousand supporters are making the trip, but those who are staying at home are left with the nightmare of not seeing the game at all. What could be the country's biggest match in over two decades isn't scheduled to be screened in the UK. It was confirmed to the Belfast Telegraph last night that neither BBC Northern Ireland or Sky Sports have bought up the rights for the match and it is understood Spanish broadcasters want 250,000 euros for those television rights, which both companies feel is excessive as the game could end up as a dead rubber. Source: Belfast Telegraph, 15th Nov 2007
* Pan-African satellite-based pay TV service, GTV, has acquired exclusive broadcast rights for the FA Cup, England Internationals and the Community Shield for the four years from the 2008-09 season. Part of the English Football Association’s US$300 million, four-year rights deal, GTV’s package will also include all England international home games and The Community Shield. The deal covers 44 countries in sub-Saharan Africa and forms part of a wider multi-million dollar investment in programming from GTV, which has already secured a three-year deal starting with the current season for 80% of the Barclays Premier League and also owns rights for Italian football’s Serie A. Source: Sport Business, 15th Nov 2007
* The Netherlands and Belgium have formally indicated their intention to bid to co-host the 2018 FIFA World Cup. Nominations do not have to be declared until 2009, but the two neighbouring countries met with FIFA president Sepp Blatter in Zurich to indicate they would bid. Dutch Football Federation (KNVB) president Jeu Sprengers and his Belgian counterpart Francois de Keersmaecker both met Blatter and outlined the bid from the two nations who co-hosted Euro 2000. Source: Football Insider, Sport Business, Sportcal, 15th Nov 2007
* NASCAR Digital Entertainment (NDE) and Creative Artists Entertainment Group have partnered for the new culinary reality competition TV series, NASCAR: Serving It Up, which will launch in syndication in September 2008. The 40x30-minute show is a grassroots cooking competition to find the next great culinary personality, showcasing NASCAR and its race events as well. Each episode will be taped during a NASCAR race weekend, and will narrow down the chef hopefuls each week until only two remain to battle it out in a showdown finale. The series will run from September 2008 through September 2009, with additional production partners to be announced moving forward. Source: Worldscreen, 15th Nov 2007
MORE NEWS
India/Broadcaster: Slow Growth for Indian IPTV
IPTV in India will be slow to take off, stymied by low broadband penetration and an existing base of low-fee-paying analogue cable TV users. A new study from consultancy firm Gartner says that even though the Indian government has set targets for the growth of broadband internet connections, penetration will remain low in the medium term. In 2006, there were 1.6 million broadband lines which is forecast to grow to only 6.4 million by 2011.
IPTV services will remain a minority distribution method, in under one million homes even by 2011. Operators are targeting the same wealthy segment of the market as the relatively-new digital cable and DTH platforms. These other pay-TV platforms will compete aggressively for subscribers, effectively closing off the market to new technologies. Neha Gupta, a Gartner senior research analyst, said: "Without a mass-market broadband usage in place, the Indian IPTV subscriber base will struggle to exceed 1 million in the next four years.”
While analogue cable subscribers pay around Rs150 to Rs300, IPTV is likely to be priced at Rs300 to Rs500, at a similar level as DTH and digital cable services. Currently, India Online (IOL) offers an IPTV service on the lines of telco MTNL. Other companies set to offer IPTV include major telco Bharti Airtel and Time Broadband Services. Source: Rapid TV News, 15th Nov 2007
India/General: Line-ups Confirmed for First Indian Cricket League Event
The Indian Cricket League, a body which is organising an unofficial Twenty20 competition outside the auspices of the Board of Control for Cricket in India, has unveiled the six squads who will take part in its inaugural tournament. The Mumbai Champs, Hyderabad Heroes, Chandigarh Lions, Chennai Superstars, Delhi Jets and Kolkata Tigers will be made up of local talent and overseas players and hold practice camps in their home cities before the start of the league this month.
West Indian legend Brain Lara and former Pakistan captain Inzamam-ul-Haq are the biggest foreign names to have been signed up, but many current internationals have been dissuaded from joining the venture for fear of jeopardising their careers. The England and Wales Cricket Board has joined the BCCI and other national bodies in threatening sanctions against players involved in the ICL.
The players look set to be excluded from the Indian Premier League, the BCCI’s official Twenty20 competition in April and a multi-national Champions League event in the subcontinent later in the year. The ICL is backed by Essel Group, the owner of media group Zee Telefilms, and matches will take place from November 30 to December 16 at the Tau Devi Lal Cricket Stadium in Panchkula, Chandigarh. Source: Sportcal, 15th Nov 2007
Elsewhere/Rights: Competition Watchdog Supports LFP's Four-Year TV Contracts
The LFP, the French professional soccer league, is set to receive approval from the Conseil de Concurrence, the French competition authority, for its plans to lengthen television contracts from three years to four. The league is planning to launch its rights tender at the end of November or the beginning of December for the period from 2008-09 onwards and should now be able to offer four-year deals, despite a recent ruling by the Conseil de Concurrence that three-year contracts were sufficient.
By extending contracts to four years, the LFP hopes to attract new bidders and enliven a market currently dominated by Canal Plus, the pay-television broadcaster which has merged with rival TPS. The Conseil de Concurrence is set to publish a decree at the end of November backing the league’s plans, according to the AFP news agency. Having made its decision on November 9, the competition body submitted its recommendation this week to the Direction générale de la consommation et de la répression des frauds, another competition regulator, which will pass it on to the French sports ministry.
The proposal is to be submitted to the government’s Conseil d’Etat next week, but no problems are foreseen as the LFP has top-level support for longer contracts. When asked by the league to consider allowing contracts to be extended to five years, the Conseil de Concurrence said in July that ‘the length of three years is satisfactory, in that it does not close the market for too long a period, leaving the buyer enough time to recoup its investment.’
The results of the tender are expected in January or February. Canal Plus is the current holder of the live rights to the top-tier Ligue 1, but has repeatedly warned that it is not willing to match its current €600 million- ($877.7 million-) a-year deal. Consequently, the league is reported to have divided the rights into around 12 lots or packages, compared to seven for the previous tender, in an attempt to bring new bidders to the market. Source: Sportcal, 15th Nov 2007
Elsewhere/General: Shirt Sponsorships Increase Again
The prices paid by shirt sponsors within European football’s six key markets has grown to €405.3 million this season, up from €366.3 million last season according to a new report from Sport+Markt. The Sport+Markt ‘European Jersey Report’ reveals the prices paid in the UK, Germany, Spain, Italy, France, and the Netherlands for the 2007-08 season went up a cumulative 10.6 per cent. Only in France‘s Ligue 1 was there a decline in income from jersey sponsorship.
In the UK total revenue from jersey sponsorship spend for the 2007-08 season was €97.5 million, in Germany the figure was €95.5 million, in Italy €71.8 million, in France €51.0 million, in Spain €50.2 million and in the Netherlands €39.5 million. The top six club deals in Europe were: Manchester United (AIG - €20.8 million p.a), Bayern Munich (T-Home - €20.0 million p.a), Real Madrid (Bwin - €15.0 million p.a), Chelsea (Samsung - €14.5 million p.a), AC Milan (Bwin - €12.0 million p.a) and Schalke (Gazprom - €12.0 million p.a).
Hartmut Zastrow, executive director of sport+Markt said: “With a 10.6% increase in revenue in the top six European leagues, jersey sponsorship again demonstrates its growing significance. Real Madrid CF and AC Milan are the biggest bargains in Europe! If a prize was awarded for Europe‘s most efficient sponsor, sports betting provider Bwin would currently win. It is a fantastic deal for them to pay a mere €27 million for the two top global brands. Combined, these two great champions are worth between €50 million and €70 million.”
He added that: “English Premier League clubs have improved strongly regarding the marketing of their jerseys. However, the Bundesliga still generates the highest income per team, with an average of €5.3 million per jersey deal. The gap in jersey marketing between big and small clubs is particularly extreme in Spain. The Bundesliga‘s bottom-placed club, Energie Cottbus, would be in eighth position in the Primera División with its jersey income of approx. €1.7 million.”
Of the clubs in the top six European leagues 17 have their kit supplied by Nike, 15 by Umbro, 14 by Adidas, 10 by Puma and 7 by Kappa. Hartmut Zastrow, executive director of sport+Markt said: “With its purchase of Umbro, Nike is clearly number one amongst Europe‘s kit suppliers. The Americans continue their offensive against Adidas in football. However, in my eyes, the German company‘s strategy of focusing on a few major clubs is extremely intelligent.” Source: Sport Business, 15th Nov 2007
Thursday, 15th November 2007
SPORTS SHORTS
* The International Olympic Committee has announced an agreement with Television New Zealand (TVNZ) for the internet and mobile platform exhibition rights within New Zealand for the Beijing 2008 Olympic Games. The IOC selected TVNZ on their capacity to guarantee full exploitation of the broadcast rights over a variety of platforms and their commitment to promoting the Olympic Games and the values of the Olympic Movement. The IOC’s over-the-air broadcast partner through to Beijing 2008 is also TVNZ. Source: Sports e-Media, Sportcal, 14th Nov 2007
* NHK, Japan’s public-service broadcaster, has agreed a three-year deal with Sportfive to show weekly coverage of English soccer’s top-tier Barclays Premier League. The deal supplements existing live coverage of the league in Japan on J Sports, the cable and satellite sports broadcaster. Sportfive has worked with the Premier League to carve out free-to-air packages in Japan and has already signed deals with terrestrial networks Fuji TV, TBS, Nippon TV and TV Asahi. However, the lion’s share of the broadcast rights remain with J Sports, which eventually agreed a three-year deal with Sportfive as the 2007-08 Premier League season kicked off. Source: Sportcal, 14th Nov 2007
* China will have a whopping 84 million digital-cable subscribers by 2010, according to new figures from research outfit Media Partners Asia (MPA). In its most recent journal, MPA says that by 2010, almost half of China’s cable TV subscription base will have been converted to digital – a government priority. Those subscribers will help revenues to reach RMB26.4 billion (US$3.6 billion) with RMB6.5 billion of that coming from digital pay-TV and “related value-added services”. By the end of this year, the Chinese digital cable TV market will generate RMB5.8 billion in subscription revenues with RMB1.1 billion accruing from digital pay-TV services. Source: Rapid TV News, 14th Nov 2007
* Singapore has been included as a stopover on sailing’s round-the-world Volvo Ocean Race for the first time. India and China will also be involved in the organisation of the 2008-09 event. Singapore will be the fifth stop in the race, which starts in the Spanish city of Alicante in October of next year and ends in St Petersburg, Russia in July 2009. While the main action will take place on the open sea, spectators will be able to enjoy a range of activities on land. The race is expected to attract over a billion television viewers, raising Singapore's profile in the world of sports. From Singapore, the race heads to Qingdao in China, with the boats scheduled to arrive on February 21. Source: Sportcal, 14th Nov 2007
* Austrian public-service broadcaster, ORF is set to cut its budget for 2008 by up to €30 million ($44 million) after investing in sports rights and failing to achieve advertising targets. Having signed a deal for soccer’s 2008 European Championships, worth between €8.5 million and €10 million, and secured rights for the 2008 Olympics, ORF has been forced to make cuts, most noticeably in programming. There are also concerns that companies may not be willing to advertise during the 2008 Olympics because of the unfavourable time difference. Source: Sportcal, 14th Nov 2007
* The Rugby Football League has said that it will only increase the number of teams in the top-tier Super League if there is a considerable rise in television revenue in the next rights deal. Plans are afoot to add two teams to the Super League, taking the number to 14, in 2009. However, this is conditional on the RFL receiving a better offer than the current £9 million ($18.7 million) –a-year deal with pay-television operator BSkyB, which expires at the end of the 2008 season. BSkyB’s rival Setanta, which now shows Australian rugby league, is expected to compete for the contract. Source: Sportcal, 14th Nov 2007
* German pay-television broadcaster, Premiere, is hoping that two new studies into audience figures for the German Bundesliga will convince sponsors of the worth of pay-television coverage and later free-to-air highlights. The broadcaster has presented a study carried out by Sport+Markt, which found that fans who watched Premiere coverage could remember the names of more shirt sponsors than those fans who watched Sportschau, the free-to-air highlights programme broadcast on Saturdays at 6.30pm by public-service network ARD. In addition, it found that 41% of Sportschau’s followers could not name a single shirt sponsor. Meanwhile, a survey conducted by IFM found that the number of children between the ages of 3 and 13 watching Sportschau would fall by 23% if the programme is delayed until 10pm. Source: Sportcal, 14th Nov 2007
* The International Fight League agreed a deal with YouTube to provide and share short form content. The deal is the first partnership YouTube has formed in the sport of mixed martial arts, and follows the path of similar partnerships with the NBA, NHL, CBS and EA Sports among others. The partnership will provide IFL content to websites around the globe that use Google AdSense and YouTube players. The partnership includes working with Google and YouTube in a revenue sharing model that would allow IFL to generate income from advertisements shown in conjunction with its videos. The videos will be available on YouTube as well as other Google AdSense partner sites that cover the sport. Source: Sport Business, 14th Nov 2007
MORE NEWS
China/Rights: Sohu Acquires Online Rights of Premier League Clubs
Chinese internet portal Sohu has acquired the broadband rights for 16 clubs in English soccer's top-tier Premier League. The deal was agreed through its partner PremierGoals, which has an agreement with 75 per cent of Premier League clubs for the distribution of match footage and pictures in China. The deal is effective immediately and will run until the end of the 2009-10 season, although financial terms were not disclosed.
The site, premiergoals.com, will be produced by Sohu and the free match highlights and delayed coverage will also be available on the portal's sports channel and mobile phones. The 16 clubs covered are: Aston Villa, Birmingham, Blackburn, Bolton, Derby, Everton, Fulham, Liverpool, Manchester City, Newcastle, Portsmouth, Reading, Tottenham, West Ham and Wigan. It is estimated that there are at least 30 million Premier League fans in mainland China, while Sohu averages around 300 million page views and 40 million unique visitors per day.
Manchester City manager Sven-Goran Eriksson attended the launch ceremony for the new service, where it was announced that the club is likely to tour China in May or June of next year. Ao Ming, director of Sohu sports channel, said: ‘It's a long-term investment, and we believe the copyright and exclusive videos can help us gain more users for Sohu as a whole, and eventually pay back in terms of advertisement spending from our customers who recognize our website's value.’ Source: Sportcal, 14th Nov 2007
Elsewhere/Rights: Ambitious GTV Swoops for More English and African Soccer Rights
GTV, the ambitious five-month-old pan-African pay-television operator, has expanded its portfolio with the acquisition of rights to more soccer matches in England and via a record sponsorship and rights deal with the Council for East and Central Africa Football Association. It was announced today that GTV, which is now active in 10 countries and will soon expand to 14, has secured the rights to England’s home matches and the FA Cup knockout competition in 44 nations in sub-Saharan Africa for four years, beginning with the 2008-09 season.
The new deal with England’s Football Association will complement this offering as GTV bids to establish itself as the top broadcaster of African and other soccer across the continent. The fledgling operation also has selected rights to Italy’s top-tier Serie A league and is offering a first-ever television platform for the leagues in Uganda and Tanzania, agreeing to show six live games, plus highlights of others, over the course of the season.
The deal with CECAFA is worth $6 million and runs until 2011, providing GTV with exclusive rights to broadcast all CECAFA tournaments, beginning with the CECAFA Senior Challenge Cup, scheduled to take place in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania on December 8 to 22. GTV is understood to have beaten off interest from Multichoice in bidding for the rights. The sponsorship will inject $500,000 into the Senior Challenge Cup, enabling organisers to transport teams to the competition and offer total prize money of $60,000. The sponsorship deal follows the expiry of a three-year, $600,000 sponsorship deal with Saudi Arabian tycoon Sheikh Muhammed Al Amoudi. The members of CECAFA are Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania, Sudan, Ethiopia, Eritrea, Zanzibar, Somalia, Rwanda, Burundi and Djibouti.
When the Premier League kicked off in August, there was criticism of GTV’s limited reach, with coverage available in only five countries: Botswana, Kenya, Mauritius, Tanzania and Uganda. However, since then it has added Ghana, Malawi, Namibia, Rwanda and Zambia to the list and exceeded its initial subscriber target of 20,000. The FA claims to have secured £145 million ($300 million) from international deals covering the period from 2008 to 2012. This is a 275-per-cent increase on the a £38.5 million generated last time round. The income is in addition to the £425 million from a domestic tie-up with UK free-to-air broadcaster ITV and pay-television operator Setanta, a 42-per-cent increase on the present deal with rivals the BBC and BSkyB. Source: Sportcal, 14th Nov 2007
Elsewhere/Rights: LFP Considers Sunday Evening Ligue 1 Highlights
The LFP, the French professional soccer league, is said to be considering moving free-to-air league highlights to 5pm on Sundays as it prepares the tender for the 2008-09 to 2011-12 seasons. The league is reported to have divided the rights into around 12 lots or packages, compared to seven for the previous tender, and has explored the possibility of rescheduling the highlights, currently shown by public-service broadcaster France Télévisions on Sunday lunchtimes.
France Télévisions acquired the highlights rights for the 2007-08 season at a cost of around €25 million ($36.7 million), and its new 'France 2 Foot' show televises match action previously available on Téléfoot, the highlights programme of commercial network TF1. The time change may find favour with France Télévisions, should it retain the rights, as it would be able to generate more money from advertising and schedule 'France 2 Foot' before 'Stade 2,' its sports news programme.
'France 2 Foot' has struggled to match the viewership of 'Téléfoot,' which has reinvented itself as ‘the magazine show for international football' after the loss of the Ligue 1 highlights. Free-to-air Ligue 1 highlights have traditionally failed to pull in large viewing figures, with fans often preferring to watch ‘Jour de Foot,’ the Saturday-evening highlights show offered by Canal Plus, the French pay-television broadcaster. One of the other lots to be made available to French broadcasters is for delayed match coverage, a package the league has tried to make more attractive by delaying the clubs’ right to exploit the match replays by 24 hours until midnight on Sunday-Monday.
Meanwhile, Canal Plus, the incumbent live rights holder, has been warned that its subscriber base will fall by at least a quarter if it fails to retain the Ligue 1 contract. The broadcaster currently pays €600 million-a-year for the rights and has constantly warned that it is not willing to match that fee in a new deal beyond 2008-09. Source: Sportcal, 14th Nov 2007
Wednesday, 14th November 2007
DID YOU KNOW…?
* Israeli entrepreneur Moshe Hogeg has bought a club in the country’s sixth division where the fans decide by email vote who plays. Hogeg bought Tel-Aviv amateur side Hapoel Kiryat Shalom for €180,000 and visitors to his website vote on the line-up and tactics during their games in the Israeli sixth division. During matches, fans - 10,000 logged on for the first game of the season - watch the game on a live video feed and use a chat forum to debate changes which are then then voted on and the coach, sitting in the dugout with a laptop, carries out their wishes. Hogeg said: “Most players are happy with it. One has been at the club a long time and normally would be in the starting XI but he has been voted out. He isn't very happy.” Source: Football Insider, 13th Nov 2007
* Money in sports. The size of the entire US sports industry in 2006 was worth $213 billion (about Sh14 trillion), more than twice the size of that country’s auto industry and seven times the size of its movie industry. Media broadcast rights account for $6.99 billion or 3.6% of the total. The Big 4 League and NASCAR total $5.29 billion while college sports amount to $1.06 billion. Other sports make up the balance $640 million. Source: Sports Business Journal
SPORTS SHORTS
* Rupavahini, the Sri Lankan state broadcaster, has agreed to act as a sponsor of the country’s domestic cricket competitions for the next five years. The deal is worth SLRs50 million ($453,000) and will permit Rupavihni to provide live coverage as well as financial support for first class, one-day and Twenty20 matches organised by Sri Lanka Cricket. The Premier limited overs competition begins on Wednesday and Rupavihni will televise both semi-finals and the final live in December. Source: Sportcal, 13th Nov 2007
* Xinhua Finance Media subsidiary Small zWorld Television Limited has agreed a deal with NBC Olympics to jointly produce an animated series about the Games. ‘Ring Force Five’ will feature five futuristic Olympians who travel back in time to experience the “true essence and spirit of the modern Games,” according to a statement. The two companies will co-operate in the creation, promotion, distribution, product merchandising, sponsored product placement and advertising sales related to the series. The first project related to the series is likely to be a one-hour DVD, which will be released in the United States just before the start of the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games, which will run from August 8-24. Source: Sports Media, 13th Nov 2007
* India's mobile advertising is catching on like wild fire, the new trend is gaining speed to the point that industry professionals are saying it could very easily soon surpass online advertising. Online advertising in India is expected to peak by the end of 2009, when mobile ads are supposedly going to skyrocket. It is thought that customized, targeted advertisements will be what boost the growth of mobile ads. Currently online advertising claims about $75 million which is 1.8% of the country's ad spend. It is projected to grow by 3.1% in the 2008-2009 fiscal year, and another 7.1% in 2010-2011. Mobile only claims about $1.5 million, yet the country continues to add about 7.5 million mobiles a month. Online users in India measure at 35-40 million, while mobile users total 208 million, according to a study conducted by The Kelsey Group. Source: Ken Radio, 7th Nov 2007
* Big money and growing consumer interest is turning golf into the fastest growing urban sport in India. For the first time ever, India will host two prestigious golf tournaments in Feb 2008: the $2.5 million European Tour Indian Masters and the $2.5 million Johnnie Walker Classic. The sport is growing in countries such as Korea, Japan, India, China, Germany, UK and South Africa and the golf market in India has been forecast to grow 25% annually in the next five years. Worldwide, golf is a $7.1 billion industry and in India it is estimated to be growing at 30-40% annually, valued at between Rs 50-60 crore, according to golf event management firm, Tiger Sports Marketing, which is managing the Indian Masters. Source: Times of India, 10th Nov 2007
* Australian commercial broadcaster, Seven Network, which televises the Australian Open tennis championships has prolonged its deal with the organisers of the grand slam tournament until 2014. The existing agreement between Seven and Tennis Australia, covering the Australian Open, preceding tournaments and the Davis Cup, the men’s team competition, was due to expire in 2009, but has now been extended by five years. The financial commitment is believed to be significantly in excess of the present $10 million- ($9.1 million-) a-year deal. Seven will have new media rights in addition to free-to air and subscription television rights. The broadcaster has shown the Australian Open since 1973 and will begin high-definition coverage of the tournament in January 2009. Source: Sportcal, 13th Nov 2007
* The Toronto Maple Leafs generated US$23 million in local TV revenues last year to secure the title of the most valuable NHL franchise in the League, according to a new study by financial analyst Forbes. The Maple Leafs collected the top local TV revenues of any NHL team and is worth $413 million, according to Forbes, which creates a ‘rich list’ of all of the United States’ major sports leagues. “With only $6 million per team in national television revenue ($8 million for most Canadian franchises), real estate economics and local television deals still determine the league's pecking order,” stated a press release from Forbes. Source: Sports Media, 13th Nov 2007
* The Italian government has approved an overhaul of the way domestic football TV rights are sold, according to a report. Sole 24 Ore claims the rights will be sold collectively rather than by individual clubs, although the decree would still be subject to parliamentary approval. If the change is given the go-ahead, the new process will be activated in 2010. The report added that the league would be able to auction rights for individual distribution platforms or offer different packages to broadcasters, and the contracts would run for a maximum of three years. Source: Sports Media, 13th Nov 2007
* The FIH, field hockey’s world governing body, will introduce a new world-level event in 2009 to ‘give more continuity to the calendar.’ The FIH said it was important for top countries to meet more regularly, as under the present format they compete only in the Olympics and the World Cup every four years, and in the Champions Trophy annually. The event will take place in Dubai in early 2009, bringing together the top eight men’s and top eight women’s teams. The decision was confirmed at a meeting of the FIH executive board in New Delhi on Friday. The board held its first meeting with organisers of the 2010 World Cup in the Indian capital after New Delhi was last week chosen to host the event. Source: Sportcal, 13th Nov 2007
MORE NEWS
Asia/Rights: MP & Silva and Dentsu Ties Up Major Serie A Media Rights Deals
MP & Silva and Dentsu Inc. announced today that they have concluded deals with 24 Asian broadcasters and telecom operators for the media rights of Italy’s top professional football league, Serie A. The agreements covers 16 territories – spanning across the majority of countries in the Asia-Pacific region, including China, Hong Kong, Japan, South Korea, Singapore, Taiwan, Macau, Brunei, Indonesia, Malaysia, Bhutan, Laos, Cambodia, Myanmar, Thailand and Vietnam.
Companies that have signed major deals with MP & Silva and Dentsu include Japanese pay-TV operator, SKY PerfecTV!, China terrestrial network, CCTV, Korea-based MBC ESPN, Chinese pay-TV, Eurosoccer TV, and Indonesian free-to-air broadcaster, TRANS TV.
Major terrestrial channels in Indonesia, China, Thailand and Japan have also signed up to broadcast ‘LIVE’ and delayed matches, and have achieved strong viewership in their respective countries so far – with Indonesia’s TRANS 7 achieving record ratings for a recent match between AS Roma against Internazionale. Four Japanese terrestrial broadcasters, Fuji Television Network, Nippon Television Network, Tokyo Broadcasting System (TBS), and TV Asahi have also agreed terms to broadcast ‘LIVE’ and delayed matches, and will greatly extend Serie A’s reach in Japan.
In a milestone agreement, the agencies have also signed a deal with Taiwanese broadcaster, Chinese Satellite Network, which will see Serie A matches being broadcasted in the country for the first time.
The inked deals will also see Serie A matches being distributed across multiple platforms and formats – especially in the key markets in the region, such as China (free-to-air terrestrial, pay-TV satellite and cable, ADSL PC, and mobile), and Japan (free-to-air terrestrial, pay-TV cable and satellite, and ADSL PC). In Hong Kong, consumers will be provided with two different pay-TV platforms via Hong Kong’s leading operators, PCCW’s NOW TV (IPTV), and i-CABLE (satellite and cable). Source: Sports e-Media, 12th Oct 2007
India/General: New Dates Sought for Asia Cup as Twenty20 Takes Precedence
The Board of Control for Cricket in India has requested new dates for the Asia Cup, a one-day competition involving national teams from across the continent, to ensure that it does not clash with its lucrative new Twenty20 event. The Indian Premier League, involving eight franchise teams and top domestic and overseas players, is due to take place in April, when Pakistan is due to host the ninth edition of the Asia Cup. A board meeting of the BCCI was due to be held today with a proposal to be issued to the Asian Cricket Council to move its six-team event.
The Asia Cup has already been delayed on several occasions because of fixture congestion, but the ACC is committed to staging the tournament on a biennial basis from next year. It was last held in Sri Lanka in 2004, when the hosts defeated India in the final. The ACC is likely to consider rescheduling the 2008 event at its meeting in India in December. India seem more committed to an Asian tri-series that will take place in Bangladesh in May of next year. The BCCI confirmed yesterday that the national team will participate in the event, which will also involve the hosts and Pakistan, the replacements for South Africa.
Meanwhile, plans for the inaugural IPL are advancing, with the organisers having invited media groups ESPN Star Sports, Nimbus Sports and Sony Entertainment Television to present offers for the rights on November 17. The tender document will be available from November 21 to December 7 and the rights will be awarded by the BCCI on December 7. Interest will have been boosted by reports that the Future Group and the Manipal Group are looking to team up with Indian star Sachin Tendulkar to own the Mumbai-based team.
The Kingfisher Group, another Indian conglomerate, is said to be targeting the Bangalore franchise, while telecoms giant Bharti Airtel and drinks company United Breweries are among the other companies looking at IPL teams. The BCCI is said to have set a floor of $50 million for a 10-year ownership deal and bids could range from $75 million to $90 million. The IPL will comprise 56 games between eight teams competing for $3 million in prize money and the organisers have signed up around 50 foreign players, including Australians Ricky Ponting, Shane Warne and Glenn McGrath, South Africans Graeme Smith and Shaun Pollock and Pakistan star Shoaib Akhtar.
The BCCI is hoping to capitalise on India’s triumph in the inaugural World Twenty20 in South Africa in September and supersede the Indian Cricket League, which is organising an unofficial Twenty20 competition due to start later this month. The six-team ICL, which is backed by Essel Group, the owner of media group Zee Telefilms, has also been recruiting overseas, with Chris Read, the former England wicketkeeper, the latest player to be linked with the event.
The BCCI has threatened to ban domestic players who sign up for the competition and the England and Wales Cricket Board has warned that it could take action against county players who participate. The first ICL Twenty20 competition takes place from November 30 to December 16 at the Tau Devi Lal Cricket Stadium in Panchkula, Chandigarh. Source: Sportcal, 13th Nov 2007
Elsewhere/General: Sportfive and IEC Launch the Transorientale
Sportfive and IEC in Sports launched the Transorientale, a 10,000 kilometre, 17-day rally. The rally, put together by triple Dakar champion, René Metge, will kick off in Saint Petersburg on June 12, 2008 and finish in Beijing, at the Great Wall of China, on June 28. The rally will take in tracks across wild, stunning scenery and encounters with the differing cultures of Russia, Kazakhstan and China, three countries in full economic expansion.
To enable everyone to participate at their own level and in accordance with their passion, vehicle capacity and budget, several categories have been set up: the competition raid, which will include a relay option, the regular raid and the discovery raid - a first-time for this type of event. Sportfive will handle the audiovisual production and marketing of the event, working to find and engage sponsors. IEC in Sports will handle the sale of the audiovisual rights. The two companies, subsidiaries of Lagardère Sports, expect to attract a wide portfolio of competitors as well as constructors and partners for the rally. Source: Sport Business, Sportcal, 13th Nov 2007
ARTICLES, COMMENTS & OPINIONS
Desire for Profits Killing Clubs' Identities
Phil Holland comments on ESPN Soccernet, 9th Nov 2007
Just in case anyone needed reminding of the influence wealthy foreign investors have over football in the UK and the English Premier League in particular, the publication this week of the Football Rich List Top 100 confirmed the worst fears of many. Domestic football on the Sceptred Isle is undoubtedly becoming the preserve of the enigmatic billionaire from overseas, usually shrouded in mystery and occasionally besieged by skeletons emerging from closets.
The list, compiled and published by FourFourTwo magazine, shows that eight of the richest men involved in British football clubs are billionaires and that four of them (Roman Abramovich, Alisher Usmanov, Malcolm Glazer and Stan Kroenke) are foreigners. Simply being foreign is not the problem, unless you happen to be a knee-jerk reactionary or an extreme football traditionalist, the worry is that football clubs in the UK are at risk of losing their status as vital community assets.
When wealthy investors from overseas emerge and assume controlling interests in clubs, which in many cases are over 100 years old, the worry is not only that the investors know little of such heritage, but that they care even less. One question in recent years has been why only foreign investors are taking an interest in the Premier League? Well, it now seems the wealthy of Britain are catching onto the craze and getting involved. The top ten new entries on the Rich List shows that half are British businessmen (Bernie Ecclestone, Mike Ashley, Lord Ashcroft, Michael Spencer and Lord Harris), however, this still means that 50% of the new entries are from overseas.
One dilemma worrying those people who dwell on such matters is why these wealthy individuals, be they British or not, are choosing to get involved in football in the first place, questioning their long-term objectives. In other figures released this week The Daily Telegraph newspaper reported that the Premier League is worth £700million more than other leading leagues in Europe based on revenues derived from television and media rights sales, especially with regard to sales in markets around the world.
The Premier League's overseas television rights, which makes the league available in more than 600 homes in 202 countries across the globe, is worth £625million for this and the next two seasons. Such is the interest in the Premier League internationally that there is an increasing expectation that overseas rights sales could eventually be worth more than the £1.7billion currently paid for domestic coverage in the UK from pay-TV operators BSkyB and Setanta.
And this is the reason investors are so keen to get in on the action. With the possible exception of Roman Abramovich, who with a personal fortune estimated in excess of £10billion can afford expensive pastimes; businessmen are getting involved in football because they believe the potential return makes their investment a no-brainer. The worry for many, apart from the inevitable watering-down of clubs' local identities, is what will happen if a club's Sugar Daddy gets bored and decides to get out?
Unless a club is run prudently, like an efficient money-making machine, it will have no chance of surviving without the wherewithal of its benefactor. But do we really want our clubs run in such a way? That is not say clubs should not be run prudently, without paying careful attention to their profit and loss spreadsheets, but there is something distasteful about your local club being run as a profit driven entity which pays a handsome dividend to the already stratospherically wealthy.