Sportradar to take over IMG Arena asset from Endeavor
The deal was announced during Sportradar’s 2024 earnings call today (19 March). With the onboarding of IMG Arena, Sportradar will add roughly 70 global betting rights to its portfolio, including Wimbledon, the PGA Tour and the US Open. The deal is expected to close towards the end of this year.
IMG Arena’s rights cover 39,000 “official data events” and 30,000 streaming events. Following the closure of the deal, Sportradar will hold betting rights to three of the four Grand Slams.
Under the deal’s financial structure, Endeavor will make a payment of $125 million to Sportradar, while $100 million in cash repayments will be made by Endeavor to IMG Arena’s sports rightsholders
In an analyst note, Regulus Partners noted Sportrader would take the costs of operating the business unit off of Endeavor’s books.
“The latest deal means that Endeavor is paying Sportradar to take on the cost of rights (and probably redundancies) rather than recognising any value in what was created – with Sportradar being paid $125 million in cash while rightsholders get up to $100 million in prepayments to further de-risk the deal, costing Endeavor up to $225 million to dispose of its colossal strategic failure,” the note said.
OpenBet management buyout separate to IMG Arena offloading
As part of Endeavor’s $13 billion private equity buyout by Silver Lake, IMG Arena and sportsbook tech platform OpenBet were put up for sale by Endeavor in August 2024.
A subsequent $450 million management buyout (MBO) was proposed for the OpenBet business in November. At this point, Endeavor said it was still seeking a buyer for the IMG Arena assets.
Under the terms of the MBO, Endeavor CEO Ariel Emanuel and OpenBet CEO Jordan Levin sought to take control of the business via holding company OB Global Holdings.
At the time, Levin said the deal allowed the group to continue OpenBet’s market expansion and product development.
“Our group is extremely confident in OpenBet’s future considering the premium product offering, superior talent, and solid foundation we already have in place following a strong period of business growth,” Levin said.
Sportradar to ‘realise the full economic potential’ of IMG Arena
Commenting on the deal, Sportaradar CEO Carsten Koerl said he was confident the company could “realise the full economic potential” of the IMG Arena portfolio.
“Given our proven track record of maximising ROI through our global betting rights deals and our strengthened position across tennis, basketball and soccer, we are confident in our ability to realise the full economic potential of this portfolio,” Koerl said.
“The addition of these strategic rights will unlock new growth opportunities, enabling us to deliver exceptional value to our partners, clients and shareholders.
Last year, Sportradar acquired the affiliate group XLMedia’s North American business for $30 million. XLMedia held a number of gaming and sports betting assets in the US market.