Pan-European sports broadcaster Eurosport has acquired the exclusive television and digital rights for the MotoGP motorcycling championship in the Netherlands, as well as pay-television and digital rights in Belgium, for the four seasons running from 2015 to 2018.
The deal with Dorna Sports, MotoGP’s commercial rights-holder, provides live rights in HD for all rounds in all three classes, MotoGP, Moto2 and Moto3, including Friday’s free practice, Saturday’s qualifying sessions and Sunday’s races.
All rights are exclusive for Eurosport in Belgium regarding the Dutch language for the 2016 to 2018 seasons.
Eurosport also has exclusive digital rights in the Netherlands, with the exception of the Dutch TT Assen race for which it will hold non-exclusive rights. In Belgium, non-exclusive digital rights for all races will be exploited via the Eurosport Player, Eurosport’s dedicated online television service.
The agreement unveiled today (Tuesday) follows the deal signed last week for exclusive live broadcast of MotoGP in Germany for the 2015-2018 seasons – a contract that includes non-exclusive rights in Austria and Switzerland regarding the German language. In April, Eurosport also extended its existing live rights deal for the broadcast of MotoGP in France for the 2015-2017 seasons.
Jean-Thierry Augustin, chief executive of the Eurosport Group, said: “We are very pleased to further increase our coverage of MotoGP with the addition of such an extensive, exclusive agreement with Dorna for the Netherlands and Belgium. It demonstrates Eurosport’s strategic ability to deliver strong content, in a consistent way, on a multi-territory basis. Fresh from our recent announcement to be the exclusive broadcaster in Germany it is a demonstration of our regional approach that we now add these two passionate motorsport markets to the MotoGP offer and bring fans the complete race weekend experience.”