Italian pay-television operator Sky Italia has challenged a report in yesterday’s Gazzetta dello Sport which said that rival pay-television platform Mediaset Premium could be awarded satellite rights to Serie A despite having been outbid by Sky.
In a letter to the newspaper published today, Jacques Raynaud, vice president of sports channels and advertising at Sky, said: “The rules of the tender are clear and nobody can think of changing them while the tender is in progress, especially not after the presentation of bids.”
He added that the “fundamental rule” of the process was that whoever bid the most for each single package of rights should win that package.
The league created two packages of live rights to eight Serie A teams, one for satellite delivery and one for digital-terrestrial. Sky outbid Mediaset and premium sports channel Fox Sports for both packages.
Raynaud added: “In the tender, nothing prohibits the assignation of both packages to a single bidder.”
He also pointed out that the tender rules said that bids could not be made with conditions concerning the outcome of other packages.
Mediaset made four separate bids, three of which carried conditions. In the bidding for the exclusive live rights to the other 12 Serie A teams, Mediaset outbid Sky, Fox and Eurosport. However, its bid was conditional upon it also winning one of the eight-team packages.
The article that angered Sky said that the league, which is advised by the Infront Sports & Media agency, was considering giving the eight-team satellite package, plus the exclusive 12 team package, to Mediaset, and the digital-terrestrial rights to eight teams to Sky.
It said that this could be done if there was an informal understanding between the two broadcasters that they would then exchange the rights. Mediaset has no satellite platform and Sky currently does not operate a digital-terrestrial platform.
The newspaper said yesterday that neither Infront nor the league had commented but that the “hypothesis” had come from informed sources.
The author of the article, Marco Iaria, today replied to Sky’s letter saying that the article had been based on thorough research and access to “highly qualified sources.”
On Monday, the 20 Serie A clubs will meet to vote on the bids.