Sky Television has the rights for the next four Olympic Games "locked up after inking a long-term deal with the IOC," according to Dana Johannsen of the NEW ZEALAND HERALD. The network, which will also broadcast this year's Games in Rio, has secured the rights to the 2020 Tokyo Olympics along with the '24 event, "which is yet to be awarded to a host city." It will "also screen the next two Winter Olympics" in PyeongChang 2018 and Beijing 2022. The decision to "chase one of the longest broadcast deals in the company's history could be read as an aggressive move to shut out free-to-air broadcasters and other aspiring providers from the market." As traditional viewership habits change and "audiences increasingly move online, major sporting events remain one of the few reliable world mass aggregator of TV audiences." That has seen TVNZ re-emerge as a player in sporting coverage, "with the state broadcaster announcing earlier this year it had secured rights for the 2018 Commonwealth Games on the Gold Coast." But Sky Sport Dir Richard Last insists TVNZ's maneuverings "had no influence on his company's decision to seek out a multi-Olympic deal." Last said, "This deal was pretty close to being completed before Christmas, it's just it takes a little while to work through all the details. [TVNZ] was not something that figured into our thinking." Given the "massive shift in viewership habits over the past few years, investing in a deal of this length could be seen as a risky strategy." But Last believes "the Olympics will always be a safe bet." Last: "Rumors of [TV's] impending demise is probably a little bit exaggerated. And the data in the States shows that -- there was lots of talk about cord-cutting and going without a cable subscription, but I think they have risen again for the first time in a couple of years" (NZ HERALD, 3/24). STUFF's Tom Pullar-Strecker reported Last said that the Olympics are "really good telly" and as important to Sky as it had ever been. He added that it was "not unusual for the broadcaster to secure rights for sporting events that far in advance." Last: "The key thing is you can start to build it into your budgets and start working out what you are going to do." Sky Sport would broadcast 13 channels of Olympic sports from Rio and "would also provide 56 video feeds, all of which would be available on computers, phones and tablets through an app to Sky Sport subscribers" (STUFF, 3/24).
