Serie A news: Serie A is about to secure a media right agreement in which they hope to generate a substantial amount of money
The top league in Italy, Serie A, aims to generate as much as 7.2 billion euros ($7.9 billion) from the sale of its domestic TV rights. The league intends to increase the length of contracts to five years and reduce the revenue difference with other nations.
“We have tapped market in the past months and we found that operators are keen on longer contracts as they see higher returns from their investment,” Serie A Chief Executive Luigi De Siervo told reporters on Tuesday.
Serie A, which is home to top clubs like Napoli, Juventus, AC Milan, and Inter Milan, earned approximately 2.8 billion euros from the sale of its TV rights in Italy for the three-year period ending in June 2024. DAZN and Sky Italia, owned by Comcast, hold most of the rights. However, this amount is only half of what the English Premier League earns from its TV deals in its home market, according to UEFA data.
To attract broadcasters, De Siervo announced on Tuesday that he had established eight different tender schemes that could be sold.
The league is offering various contracts and game packages with different levels of exclusivity, which will be available for sale starting in June. The league has set targets for the sale, ranging from 3.6 billion euros for three-year contracts to 7.2 billion euros for five-year contracts. Usually, bidders offer less than the targets, and the league negotiates with them to improve their offers and get as close as possible to the targets.
Serie A is changing its sales process by accepting bids for individual Saturday night matches, which will allow free-to-air broadcasters to compete with pay-TV operators. Additionally, the league will offer the right to broadcast matches before major retail events such as Valentine’s Day and Black Friday, similar to Amazon’s Prime Video platform.
If this sales process is not successful, Serie A will initiate a bidding process to find a long-term financial partner to create its own media platform for distributing matches, which has already garnered interest from various banks and private equity funds.
READ ALSO: Arsenal transfer news: Granit Xhaka could be heading to Bayer Leverkusen this summer
