Football: Maltese cable operator Melita acquired live pay-television rights for all 64 matches of the 2010 World Cup in a sub-licensing deal with public service broadcaster Public Broadcasting Services. Melita will broadcast all matches in high definition. PBS channel TVM will show 46 matches live.
Football: Danish basic and medium-tier pay-channel operator SBS TV acquired the free-to-air rights for 150 to 200 matches per season from the English Premier League in a three-year deal worth €24m ($32.6m) with the Medge Consulting agency. The deal, which covers the 2010-11 to 2012-13 seasons, is pending approval by the Premier League (page 11).
Football: Hong Kong broadcaster Now TV acquired the rights for Italy’s Serie A in a two-year deal for the 2010-11 and 2011-12 seasons with the MP&Silva agency. The deal covers 304 matches a season.
Football: The IEC in Sports agency extended its deal to distribute the international media rights for the top-tier Portuguese League, Liga Sagres, for the 2010-11 and 2011-12 seasons.
Football: Bolivian state-owned telecoms company Entel finalised a six-year deal for the country’s top-tier domestic football league. The deal runs from 2010 to 2015 and is worth $1.2m (€883,500) in the 2010 season, and then $1m plus 20 per cent of any additional revenues raised through other services – including the internet, mobile and a league-related reality TV show – in each of the following years. Entel will also pay a $150,000 debt owed by the league to free-to-air commercial broadcaster Unitel for breaking the present contract, which was to expire this year.
Football: The Kuwait Football Association extended its international media rights distribution agreement with the MP & Silva agency to 2016. The deal covers Kuwaiti national teams’ qualification matches for the 2012 and 2016 Olympics, the 2014 World Cup and the 2015 Asian Football Confederations Cup.
Formula One: The Abu Dhabi Media Company acquired the exclusive rights for Formula One in the Middle East in a three-year deal from 2010 to 2012 with the Abu Dhabi circuit. The deal will see an English-language feed being broadcast on IPTV platform E-Vision, owned by Etisalat. Later in the year, the feed will be available on an ADMC sports pay-channel.
Rugby Union: A New Zealand broadcast consortium led by Maori Television and including public-service broadcaster TVNZ and commercial broadcaster TV3 acquired the free-to-air rights for 16 matches from the 2011 Rugby World Cup in a NZ$6m (€3.1m/ $4.25m) deal with the International Rugby Board. The 16 matches include the final, semi-finals, quarter-finals and New Zealand’s group matches (page 1)
You need to have a subscription to access this content
