Amazon "snatched" the U.K. rights to the US Open in a "major escalation of its move into tennis and British sports broadcasting," according to Ben Rumsby of the London TELEGRAPH. Three months after its "surprise victory" over Sky Sports in the race for the ATP World Tour, the e-commerce company secured exclusive coverage of the final grand slam of the season for the next five years. Eurosport previously held the pan-European rights and announced on Wednesday a parallel extension of that contract but excluding the U.K. and Ireland. Despite having agreed to a deal to stream Eurosport in Britain on its own platform earlier this year, Amazon "chose to carve out the US Open for itself" at an estimated cost of £30M ($39.5M). With Eurosport holding the rights to the Australian Open, French Open and, in part, Wimbledon, Amazon can now "legitimately claim to be the only place where tennis fans can watch all four grand slams" (TELEGRAPH, 11/15).
PREMIER LEAGUE BID?: In London, Mark Sweney reported Amazon's move is "likely to cause further speculation that it is a potential competitor in the upcoming Premier League rights auction." Premier League CEO Richard Scudamore said that the league is "technology neutral" and large digital companies could "pose a real threat" to rights holders BT and Sky. The pair are "preparing to go to battle" to renew their £5.14M ($6.7M) Premier League rights early next year, with both companies "hoping for an end to rampant price inflation." Google, Apple, Netflix and Facebook, which in September "stunned observers by making an ultimately unsuccessful" $600M bid for Indian Premier League cricket live streaming, are other possible rivals for U.K. sports rights. Amazon’s stock market value of $547B "makes it about 10 times the size of Sky and BT combined." Last month, Amazon agreed to a deal to "make a fly-on-the wall series" with Man City. Sources said that it is seeking to do the same with a Formula 1 team such as Ferrari (GUARDIAN, 11/15).
