Canadian public-service broadcaster the CBC has acquired rights for the 2018 and 2020 Olympic Games in partnership with telecommunications company Rogers Communications and media company BCE, which operates Bell Media.
According to the Reuters news agency, production resources will be shared amongst the three companies, with the most popular events at the 2018 winter Games in PyeongChang, South Korea and the 2020 summer Olympics in Tokyo, Japan being shown to the widest possible audience.
The CBC will be the primary broadcaster, with Bell’s TSN and Rogers’ Sportsnet pay-television channels offering secondary coverage. Secondary sports channels operated by Bell and Rogers, which are only available on more exclusive pay-television packages, will provide additional coverage.
“It is a CBC-led Games – I want to be clear about that,” BCE’s president of sports programming, Phil King, said. “The CBC put us together, the CBC had the vision to bring all three of us (together) and have been very open about wanting to use some of our people.”
Financial details of the deal were not disclosed, but the CBC’s chief executive, Hubert Lacroix, said that the agreement was “fiscally responsible.”
The agreement, which includes every edition of the Youth Olympics until 2020, covers free-to-air and pay-television, internet and mobile platforms in all languages.
The CBC already has rights for the 2016 summer Games in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.