WTA Ventures: Queen’s, CVC Capital Partners and an organisation pushing on June 16, 2025 After a successful week of WTA tennis at Queen’s, WTA Ventures chief Marina Storti discusses the state of the sport, its private equity partner CVC Capital Partners and a potential merger with the ATP. When 37-year-old Tatjana Maria upset the odds to win the HSBC Championships in front of 9,000 fans on Sunday, she became [...]
Roc Nation boss exclusive: Rugby chiefs need to get comfortable with change May 14, 2025 The president of Jay-Z’s agency Roc Nation Sports Michael Yormark has said rugby’s stakeholders need to get “comfortable being uncomfortable with change” as the sport looks to commercialise after a turbulent period. Yormark, speaking at the group’s inaugural Champions of Marketing event, told City AM that sometimes sports are “so married to history” that they’re [...]
Volleyball World: How CVC Capital Partners woke sport’s sleeping giant April 9, 2025 Volleyball World CEO Finn Taylor on how CVC Capital Partners has commercialised the sport, its successful D2C platform and ambitions to woo British fans. Private equity in sport can provoke suspicion that it will be funds rather than fans who benefit most from the transaction, yet in volleyball there can be little doubt that it [...]
Parliament warns against extending Premiership Rugby Covid-19 loans April 2, 2025 A top parliamentary committee has insisted Premiership Rugby clubs who are “financially unviable five years post-pandemic” should not have their Covid-19 loans extended. The damning report from the Public Accounts Committee – an influential group of backbench MPs who probe state spending – singled out the process in which £124m of loans funded by the [...]
Littler, Gen Z and Netflix: Why investment banks have fallen for darts March 20, 2025 Forget AI, clean energy and healthcare, there is a new hot tip for investors looking for big returns: the historically downmarket, beer-soaked world of darts. The sport is riding the crest of a wave generated by better promotion, wider consumption and, more recently, the rise and rise of teenage phenomenon Luke Littler. Ticket demand is [...]
Saudi Arabia SURJ mulls investment in World Athletics March 6, 2025 Saudi Arabia’s SURJ Sports Investment could invest in a new company dealing with the commercial arm of track and field body World Athletics. It would give the Public Investment Fund subsidiary access to a portion of the profits made by the organisation that runs the World Championships and Diamond League in a deal that could [...]
Six Nations investors CVC bids $1bn for major tennis competitions March 3, 2025 Private equity giant CVC Capital Partners are set to bid for a portfolio of high-profile tennis events worth £790m that includes the Madrid and Miami Opens. It could see the Six Nations investor add to its existing tennis interests, which include a commercial joint venture with the WTA launched in 2023. The portfolio – currently [...]
WTA Tour hires London agency Nomad Studio for ‘bold’ rebrand February 27, 2025 The WTA Tour has engaged London design agency Nomad Studio, whose clients include the Premier League and Rolls Royce, to launch a wide-ranging rebrand today. The rebrand of the women’s tennis tour includes a new logo, bright green and purple palettes, and slogan – “Rally the world” – designed to be “bigger, bolder and built [...]
DCMS issue insolvency threat to rugby clubs over Covid-19 loans February 10, 2025 Rugby clubs have been warned after the Department of Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS) said it “wouldn’t hesitate” to use “all financial levers” available to recover loan payments owed by sports organisations from the pandemic. Those powers could see the government department aid in forcing insolvency on sports clubs to ensure the taxpayer recoups the [...]
It’s not the 90s, TNT deal for Six Nations wouldn’t hurt rugby January 30, 2025 On the eve of this year’s men’s Six Nations bursts forth news that TNT Sports is preparing a bid for broadcast rights to the tournament from 2026. Cue mild hysteria at the possibility of rugby’s premier annual competition “disappearing” behind a TV paywall. An accelerant to the decline in mass interest in the sport or [...]