Germany: the 2016 Sports Media Summit will take place in Cologne on 02/06/2016

The 2016 Sports Media Summit will take place at the Congress-Centrum Nord Koelnmesse in Cologne (GER), on 02/06/2016. The programme for the 2016 edition has not yet been provided by the organisers, and registration is open as of 08/02/2016. Organised since 2006 by the German specialised media…

UK: Sky plc invests in InCrowd, a fan engagement and activations company

The British pay-TV group Sky plc is investing £300,000 (€390,000) into the British company InCrowd Sports, which specialises in mobile fan engagement and sponsorship activations, on 02/02/2016. Co-founded in 2015 by Aidan Cooney (a former CEO of Opta, Perform Group) and Archie Woodhead (former…

Turkey: Perform Group becomes the official digital services provider of Galatasaray until 2018-19

Perform Group, a British company specialising in the processing, management and marketing of sports statistics and other content, has become the digital services provider of Galatasaray SK (Spor Toto Süper Lig) until 2018-19, the club announced on 29/01/2016.Opta, a company specialising in sports…

USA: the pay channel OWS acquires the exclusive broadcasting rights, in English, to Barça TV

OWS (One World Sports) has acquired the exclusive broadcasting rights, in English in the USA, to Barça TV, the TV channel of FC Barcelona (Liga BBVA), announced the US pay channel on 01/02/2016. The rights were acquired via sublicense from the US audiovisual group Univision Communications, the…

UK: BBC acquires, from Discovery, the free-TV broadcasting rights for the 2022 and 2024 Olympics

The British public broadcaster BBC has acquired the exclusive broadcasting rights, for free-TV in the UK, to the Olympic Winter Games in 2022 (in Beijing, China) and the 2024 Summer Games (host country not yet assigned) via sublicense from the American audiovisual group Discovery Communications…

Premier League: Sunderland AFC launch a Chinese version of their website

Sunderland AFC (Premier League) are launching a Mandarin version of their website, the club announced on 02/02/2016. This version of the site will share club news, interviews, photos and videos. Sunderland will also offer content on their official YouKu account, a Chinese video hosting platform…

Germany/Poland: bidding opens for the rights of UEFA national team competitions from 2018-2022

UEFA and its partner, the marketing and media rights agency CAA Eleven, have launched the rights tender for several competitions for broadcasting in Poland, on 18/01/2015, and Germany, on 02/02/2016. Offers from interested Polish broadcasters must reach CAA Eleven no later than 16/02/2016 at noon…

Sportel Asia scheduled from 15 to 17/03/2016 at the Shangri-La Hotel in Singapore

The Sportel Asia 2016 conference will be held at the Shangri-La Hotel in Singapore from 15 to 17/03/2016. Taking place every October in Monaco, the Sportel conference, which specialises in the sports media content sector, relocates for its a second annual session in March, alternately in Asia (the…

NFL: CBS and NBC acquire the TV rights to Thursday night games from 2016-2018 (€41m per game)

The US national free-TV channels CBS and NBC have acquired the 2016-17 and 2017-18 broadcast rights for "Thursday Night Football", NFL regular season games played on Thursday evenings, on 01/02/2016. CBS and NBC acquired the rights to broadcast 10 Thursday night games (five each) for a…

Top 5: transfer spending during the 2016 winter transfer window, compared to 2015