LONDON -- Facebook has "become a fixture in the ecosystem of sport," according to one of the U.S. tech company’s execs, who has refused to rule out a bid for Premier League broadcast rights. Facebook Head of Global Sports Partnerships Dan Reed said, “The Premier League is a very important partner of ours and we work with them closely. But it would be premature to speculate how we might approach that opportunity -- it’s still very early days and there is no template for this.”
In a presentation at the Leaders Sport Business Summit on Thursday, Reed said, “We have really become a fixture in the ecosystem of sports. We are a platform. We are not just a marketing vehicle, we are not just a video destination, we are all of those things.”
Reed revealed a number of statistics to underscore that Facebook has become a popular channel for sports content. He said that there were more than 3,500 live events broadcast on Facebook in the first half of '17, including Champions League action and college lacrosse. This year, Facebook paid for rights to stream live Major League Soccer games from the U.S. on its platform. In June, it signed a deal with Fox to stream selected Champions League matches through a partnership with Fox Sports.
Reed said that it was beneficial for sports companies and rights holders to frequently post, particularly video content. He said, “We see leagues and broadcasters, even clubs posting upwards of 50 times a day,” which gives them more chances to appear in users' news feeds. Reed also extolled the virtues of its new Facebook Watch tab, which curates exclusive video content for Facebook’s partners.
There has been heightened speculation that Facebook will bid for Premier League football rights. ManU Exec Vice-Chair Ed Woodward recently said that Facebook and Amazon were very interested in a rights deal for '16-19. "Absolutely, I think they will enter the mix; anecdotally, there was incredibly strong interest in the last cycle," he said. "We are hearing that around the Premier League table, and we are also hearing that from a European perspective in terms of interest in the Champions League and Europa rights. I do think we are going to see an increasing engagement from these and we would welcome the interest.”
The Premier League also revealed it will consider media rights bids from online platforms such as Amazon, Twitter and Facebook.
Leaders is owned and operated by American City Business Journals.
John Reynolds is a writer in London.
