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Tennis Australia confirms 5 year deal with Seven

Tennis Australia confirms extending its broadcast deal for the Australian Open with Seven until 2019.

2013-06-14_1158Tennis Australia has confirmed it  has extended its broadcast deal with the Seven Network for the Australian Open and Australian Open Series for 2015-19.

This confirms TEN’s worst fears that the event was not put out to open tender, which would have enabled it to bid.

The pricetag on the rights is believed to be $40m per year, up from $21m a year.

The new agreement includes free to air, pay, digital/online, IPTV, HbbTV, mobile and tablet rights, as well as live streaming from all broadcast courts at the Australian Open and AO Series on online and mobile platforms.

The new agreement includes:
 significantly expanded free to air coverage of Australian Open and AO Series events of more than 330 hours
 a commitment to broadcast free to air on two channels during the Australian summer of tennis
 a commitment to live streaming of all Australian Open and AO Series broadcast courts online and on mobiles and tablets

Seven will cover the Australian Open and all other major tennis events in the Australian Open Series, including the Brisbane International, Apia International Sydney and AAMI Kooyong Classic.

“We are delighted to extend the historic relationship with Seven, a long term partner of tennis in Australia,” Tennis Australia CEO Steve Wood said today.

“Seven has played a key role in the success of our sport and events and we welcome their continuing involvement as our coverage expands across broadcast television and new online and tablet apps. This agreement fits in very well with our overall strategy of ensuring as much high quality tennis coverage for the Australian public as possible, freely available on whatever device the viewer chooses.”

“This is a great partnership for Seven,” Seven West Media CEO, Tim Worner, said.

“One of the key aspects of our new broadcast agreement is our ability to deliver this amazing event across multiple platforms in formats that meet the demands of our audiences. One of our key strategies for the development of our business is the delivery of live content across our media platforms. The Australian Open is an extraordinary event and so much a part of the fabric of our business over so many decades. We’re so pleased to be able to extend and expand our partnership with tennis over the coming five years.”

“This deal will ensure our devoted audience can enjoy the ultimate broadcast experience with an incredible variety. They can watch as much, and as long as possible. We have built an outstanding broadcast foundation upon which to further grow the exposure and commercial success of the Australian Open in the future,” Steve Wood said.

Seven has been the television partner of the Australian Open since 1973.

22 Responses

  1. Seven West Media CEO, Tim Worner, said.
    “One of the key aspects of our new broadcast agreement is our ability to deliver this amazing event …in formats that meet the demands of our audiences”
    Except, of course, if that format is high definition.

  2. Not sure if this such is such good move for the viewer.Sure its on FTA but with ads to ruin the experience and also promotion of upcoming programs. I wish foxtel had full rights then we will get it in high definition.

  3. Seems a good move for Tennis Australia – nearly doubling the broadcast rights without going to tender – and Seven no doubt paying a premium for the rights not going out to tender. There is no guarantee that Seven (or any other broadcaster) would have bid as much had they gone out to tender.

  4. While this is disappointing for ten, if I was tennis Australia, there is no way I would move from the stability and ratings success at seven to the absolute mess that is ten regardless of the price. The ten brand has pretty much been destroyed and i’m sure the same show would rate substantially less on ten than they would on seven or even nine (not that this could ever be tested properly).

  5. Seven’s coverage is O.K. It has improved during the last couple of years with the use of 7Two
    (they will never live down going to the news when Sammy Stosur was midway through playing a match against Serena a few years ago)

    There should be less fawning and talking up the Aussie players unless it’s warranted, Too many great matches are being missed for mediocre Aussie performances. And do we really need to see the Big 4 for the first few rounds smashing everyone in straight sets.

    Bring back Jo Griggs next year, It wasn’t the same without her.
    And start the tennis at 7pm and hold back Home and Away until it’s finished.

    I think that’s about it.

  6. Seven’s coverage is hardly brilliant, they routinely skip the first game of sets to fit more ads in and only show parts of matches.

    Last year Foxtel had the rights to show live matches from courts except for the centre court for the first week during the day. Last year most of the Australian players and Murray’s games were on Court 2&3 during the day so Seven only crossed for fragments of what was on centre court mostly showed the same game as Foxsports.

    So fans didn’t get to watch the so called main matches on Centre Court. Pretty silly scheduling by the ITF and TA.

  7. One as a sports channel showing minor sports had a 1% share of the audience. There is no way secondary channel would generate enough revenue for major sports.

    The networks won’t make their main channels HD until they are sure >99% of the audience has HD. It would cost them hundreds of millions of dollars otherwise.

    Seven had the right to negotiate with TA first. Seven were dragging it out and not offering what TA was asking. Once Ten lost-out for the international cricket, Seven realised that reaching agreement for the FTA, mobile and internet rights now was in their best interests.

  8. I say it was a bad move it will be live and less ads compared to 7. Since they have BBL, Winter Olympics, MLB, NFL and Glasgow. That way they can use One and Ten properly for the coverage

  9. Not surpirsedat this. TEN was never going to get the Tennis anyway. As others have also said so far that their treatment of The Hopman Cup is woefol. They are not utilising there channels effectively certaily not ONE, although when the Hopman Cup was baught it was for ONE HD a 24/7 Sports channel, now its just an extra sport to cover which TEN are belatedly covering. I am adament that that is what went through TA’s mind when they decided to stay with 7. Nine have cricket, TEN have Ironman series and NBL which they are not treating well. So TA thought better to stay with a proven sports broadcaster and considering 7 has finally in recent years discovered the usfullness of multichannels (someting TEN knew first), then they would be mad to put it out to tender, they may have gotten more, but the coverage would be crap, because the more a network has to pay for Tv broadcast rights chances are the more crap the coverage will be, ie not Live and full of ads to recoup the money spent and make a profit. Overall good move by 7 and TA.

  10. Tennis Australia is stupid for not opening it up and getting the maximum amount for the sport.
    That being said, Seven’s coverage has been great and getting better with use of multichannels. Very happy with their coverage.
    And Ten has the Hopman Cup now but their coverage was absolutely woeful. Wasn’t live at all, nor was every session shown. It falls in non-ratings so i don’t understand why Ten can’t show Hopman Cup live. Invest in this tournament and make it a must watch on Ten.

  11. Lol @ people bagging this deal. Sure they could of got more if they put it to market. But it’s almost double the increase than the last deal (ok, take out some of to inflation). But TA and Seven have been in partnership for many years and it has been one of the huge drivers in making the event so popular. This and With tens ever-lasting decline meaning probably a lesser audience this is the best deal for tennis in Australia. There’s no need to change a winning formula. Now I hope TA uses this money wisely to our grassroots and lower level tournaments so we can improve the quality of players of the country which is the far bigger concern for TA.

  12. Congratulations to Seven. It now seems FTA will now at last be able to run multichannel coverage of events like this once the current analogue age restrictions end later this year. Thereby shutting out the likes of Pay TV, which is why I congratulate this decision. Hopefully the second broadcast channel of thus event on Seven will be a HD channel?

  13. Why would they not put it out to the market!? Ten would have matched or beat that for sure after losing the rest of the cricket.

    Also what does this mean for fox sports?? Fox seem to be dropping their ball and losing coverage to a lot of sports. I can’t go back to watching fta sports. I am happy to continue paying for live, HD sport. But not if its not the big events.

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