RIYADH, Saudi Arabia – February 01: (RL) Michael Page of England gave Russia’s Shar Magomidov in a middleweight fight during the UFC Fight Night event in ARNA on 01 February 2025 in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia in Anb Erina in Riyadh Arabia. (Photo by Chris UNger/Zuffa LLC)
Chris Agar | UFC | Getty images
A few days after completing your merger with Skydance, of great quality Has acquired American rights TKO Group of Group UFC for seven years, starting in 2026.
Paramount is paying an average of $ 1.1 billion per year for UFC’s 13 marquee events and full slate of 30 “Fight Nights”, which is said in a statement in a statement. All matches and events will be streamful in the US through Paramount+, and select events will be simultaneous on CBS. Payment of the deal is weighed, in which Paramount has paid less than $ 1.1 billion in the early years of the deal and is later paid high values.
Paramount users will charge any additional fee for access to events, eliminating the pay-per-view model that ESPN+ has used for some premium UFC events. Disney The ESPN UFC was paying an average of $ 500 million for five years of rights. The deal is ending at the end of 2025.
“Pay-per-view model is a matter of past,” said in an interview, Chairman and Chief Operating Officer of the TKO Group, Chairman and Chief Operating Officer. “What’s on the pay-per-view? Boxing? Boxing? Films on the Directth? It’s an old, ancient model. Therefore, it was paramount for us-forgive us-forgive me-where it’s one-stop shopping, especially for our small fans in flyover states.”
It is busy for a few days for both Paramount and TKO. Paramount officially sold the company to Skydance Media to Skydance Media on Thursday, under the leadership of Chief Executive Officer David Alison. Even last week, TKO deal with Espn for five years, $ 1.6 billion For American Rights for WWE’s premium live events. UFC and WWE merged into TKO in 2023.
The TKO leadership initially admitted that it would sell the paramount to only 30 “Fight Night” events and the premium number incidents were called another media partner, Shapiro. When the Skydance-Permaunt deal went off on Thursday, both sides interacted in 48 hours, he said.
He said in an interview, it was important for Ellison to buy the entire UFC package, which he said in an interview in view of the lack of available sports rights in the coming years. Formula 1 with rights Potentially determined for Apple And Major League baseball is waiting to reorganize its major media packages by 2028, there will be no top-shelf sports assets coming in the market for paramount.
Alison said in an interview, “UFC is a unicorn property that comes once in a decade.” Alison described himself as a UFC fan.
UFC events are desirable for streamters as they take place throughout the year-the appreciation pays with a low encouragement to cancel the seasonal to pay for monthly membership. There are 43 live events annually, with 350 hours of live programming.
The company said in a statement that Paramount is interested in buying UFC’s international rights with American rights. Those rights are generated on a rolling basis, of which about one third of each year is available. The UFC matches are currently available in more than 210 countries.
Shapiro said that the paramount would have a 30-day exclusive interaction window for the rights of each country, when they are ready for renewal, Shapiro said.
