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How Nine execs -and Karl- wooed the IOC for Olympic rights.

Before there was an offer of $305m for Olympic rights, Nine had to lay the groundwork with the IOC.

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Nine’s path to acquiring Olympic Games rights for Australia until 2032 began a year ago, with a team of executives -and Today host Karl Stefnaovic- meeting with the IOC in Switzerland.

But CEO Mike Sneesby says establishing the values of the company and its many divisions was fundamental before any talk of price. Nine is the first Australian media company that will have the Olympics across television, radio, print, digital and streaming.

“When we met with the IOC, almost a year ago, there were a number of people from Nine who were part of that group over there to meet the IOC and Karl was one of many individuals in that group. A lot of the focus was on capability and how we fit together as organisations. We really weren’t in the stage of talking about dollars and cents,” he told TV Tonight.

“Over time once we established the right fit, you think about the strategic opportunity from the financial and commercial side within our organisation, then the dollars start to become part of the focus.”

Nine’s $305m deal for games in Paris, Milan, Los Angeles and Brisbane includes all audio and visual rights.

At that kind of price tag, is Nine planning to draw upon Stan for some Olympic events? Sneesby isn’t ruling it out but insists Free to Air remains the focus, with revenue to come from several platforms.

“The approach is different for Nine because our platforms are unique in terms of our reach and diversity of platforms. You will note in the release, that the rights that we have, under this agreement, are very broad, and allow us to distribute the audio visual content right across all of our platforms,” he continues.

“So the calculation approach to working out returns and forecasting what we think the revenues look like, philosophically is exactly the same. And the majority of the revenue that we expect, for the Olympic Games will still be through advertising revenue, but of course, across a more diverse range of platforms.”

He adds, “We do have the opportunity to support other sorts of revenue, like subscription revenues. But just to reiterate, because there have been questions around this, we are absolutely committed to Australians, and to the IOC to continue to broadcast and stream the Olympic Games, live and free… all of the biggest events. So you won’t see a change to that level of reach. But what you will see is availability on a lot more platforms.

“We distributed the Australian Open across free to air television, every game of the open on 9now and every game on Stan Sport. So it is a multi platform distribution, which doesn’t limit the opportunity for Aussies to get access to that through a free ad-funded version or through a a version that doesn’t have ads with subscription. That is one example. I’m not saying that’s exactly how the model will work for the Olympic Games. But we have quite a bit of flexibility in terms of distribution. The consumer will always be front and centre in terms of the greatest experience and from that there’s opportunity for us to generate revenues.”

While the Paris games are as close as next year, the main event for Australia is Brisbane 2032.

How does Sneesby see the broadcast lanscape changing so far into the future?

“It’d be very difficult for anyone to predict exactly what television will look like. But one thing I am certain of is, digital distribution and streaming will be a much bigger part of the mix. This is one of the reasons why a partnership like this with the IOC makes so much sense . Over the next 5 to 10 years, we’re gong to see rapid developments in Streaming, in terms of defining the ad-funded and the subscription markets, as well as new developments we probably haven’t considered yet,” he suggests.

“So this kind of tentpole content will be critical to building and establishing a position in those markets.’

He adds, “The team at the IOC have been absolutely fabulous. I’m not saying that, because we just signed a new agreement. They’ve been terrific through the process of reaching this agreement. So we’re really excited to be partnering with them.”

8 Responses

  2. How friendly and approachable is Mike Sneesby, David? He really seems like a modern approachable, grounded CEO to me. Always so friendly looking as well? A total diversion to the execs of old you read about in books like Broadcast Wars?

    1. Friendly, less blokey than some CEOs I have dealt with over the years. Had a bit more to do with him when he was running Stan (I particularly liked this moment) but now a bigger portfolio, so the trick is to try to cut through corporate-speak. In one face to face chat I tried at the end to ask the usual journo tricky questions. I remember I pressed twice on a touchy topic and he told me later he nearly shut it down… “three strikes and you’re out.” All part of the job!

  3. Good article David. With 9 securing the Olympics rights, I wonder what the ratings will be like during the Olympic Games. But at the end of the day, it comes down to the ratings, revenue share and the timezone. WHen 9 broadcasted the 2012 Summer Olympics, the morning session started in the afternoon & ended during the morning (the following day). LA 2028 will be a risky task due to the extensive timezone difference. Hence, primetime events will have to be shown live during morning and afternoon. Most people will be at work or school. Nevertheless, this will provide a strong lead-in to Nine News on the east coast.
    In addition to this, the media landscape will be completely different with unprecedented streaming, Subscription services, radio, podcasts, digital, print. Since Stan Sport started in Dec 2020, there has been more customers signing up for this service. I don’t use Stan, but having Stan would mean that there won’t be any ads or endless promos of reality shows or deep VO guy.

  4. I get the IOC want to make sure whoever telecasts their product will not do damage but the IOC are the ones actually producing the coverage; each broadcaster decides what, where and when to broadcast so the IOC have limited their risk from that perspective. IOC have form on this – the highest bidder (usually) wins the broadcast rights (not a criticism rather Mike seems to think it was dollars and other non financial aspects which I find very hard to believe).

  5. Great get, David. But if I put a sceptical hat on, one wonders how much Nine’s own business will change over the next decade too, including financial woes and top brass changes, all too often seen in TV land. How can the IOC be confident, by the economics and landscape of then, that Nine won’t have gown ‘down hill’, ended some of its ops, had a CEO ‘coup’ and look what happened very recently with Seven – cricket signed by one executive team… Then the new ones didn’t want a bar of it (only buckling after Nine re-signed tennis). It all comes with risk.

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