Axel Springer CEO Mathias Doepfner said that the German publisher "plans to participate in an upcoming auction of broadcasting rights for Bundesliga football, but will not be dragged into an irrational bidding war," according to Harro Ten Wolde of REUTERS. The German Football League (DFL) "wants to double its proceeds from the auction of rights for the four seasons" starting '17-18, aiming to rake in €1.1B-€1.5B ($1.3B-$1.7B) per season. This "compares with an average" of €748M for the previous four years.
At the previous auction, Axel Springer "won the rights to broadcast clips from matches on its websites, hoping to attract subscribers to the online edition of its Bild tabloid." Doepfner said that did not work out "as well as hoped." The upcoming auction, "which is planned to finish before early June when the Euro 2016 football tournament starts, will this time include a rule that no single buyer can acquire all media rights for live games as Rupert Murdoch's Sky did last time." Doepfner said that "Springer would be a disciplined bidder." Doepfner: "If the rights end up going for bigger amounts of money compared to the previous auction, I think it will be very unlikely that we will get what we want, because to us it is not worth it" (REUTERS, 5/11).
