Analysis

Handball

The Pitch International agency secured a late rights deal in the critical German market for the 2015 men’s Handball World Championship at the end of December – the last major market where a deal was outstanding.

Football

Uefa has agreed a raft of Champions League and Europa League rights deals, securing fee increases in each territory, TV Sports Markets understands.

Football

Uefa is understood to be close to a breakthrough in Russia for the rights to its European Qualifiers but still faces big challenges in Germany, where third-party rights remain unsold, and Singapore, where it has not sold any rights.

Football

MP & Silva has paid a significant increase for the rights in Japan to Euro 2016 in a deal finalised last month. The agency now faces a challenge to turn a profit on the deal.

Cycling

German public-service broadcaster ARD will return to broadcasting the Tour de France cycle race in 2015 after agreeing a two-year deal earlier this month for substantially less than the old rights fee in Germany.

Football

The renewal by Turkish pay-television operator Digiturk’s of its domestic Süper Lig rights was confirmed by the Turkish competition authority, Rekabet Kurumu, in November.

Even in a tournament in which the England national team disappointed, football matches from the Fifa World Cup dominated the top UK television audiences last year
Motorsport

Mike Kiernan, analyst for SportBusiness Intelligence, reviews television audiences across the big five markets for the recently concluded Formula One World Championship

Football

Mike Kiernan and Lukas Zajancauskas look at football's rights-fee growth in the North American market, and compare it to traditional leading US sports properties.

Tennis

Digital media company Perform and the IMG Events & Media agency have come away honours even after head-to-head battles for two of the biggest contracts in the sports betting rights market.

The global sports-rights market will grow over the next 12 months by nine per cent, according to the TVSM Global Report 2015.

Tennis

Perform’s commitment to produce and distribute live coverage of all 2,000 Women’s Tennis Association matches from 2017 will elevate the WTA to the company of the world’s elite sports leagues.

Multi-sport

The International Olympic Committee earned a significant increase from Chinese state broadcaster CCTV this month, but the new deal still falls well short of the true market value of the Games.

Equestrian

IMG Events & Media will provide the lion’s share of the Fédération Equestre Internationale’s media-rights income after the governing body this month renewed its deals with long-term partners IMG and the European Broadcasting Union.

Football

Uefa almost doubled the value of its Champions League and Europa League rights in Turkey in a deal with telco Türk Telekom for 2015-16 onwards.

Motorsport

The organisers of motor racing’s World Rally Championship believe they are well on the road to achieving something no other promoter has so far been able to: making a commercial success of the championship.

Basketball

Italian pay-television operator Sky Italia beat competition from state broadcaster Rai to land the rights to next year’s EuroBasket.

Football

The German Bundesliga is set to more than double its international rights value from 2015-16 onwards following a host of deals agreed in recent weeks.