NEW YORK: E-commerce giant Amazon has reportedly secured five-year UK TV rights to the US Open, the last tennis grand slam of the year.
While the deal terms were not disclosed, UK media reports that Amazon paid about $40 million (£50m) for the rights. The latest acquisition buttresses Amazon’s £50m, five-year deal for the UK rights to the ATP World Tour, for which it outbid Sky, UK’s Guardian reports.
While Amazon’s rights deal was not officially announced, the reports around it came in tandem with an announcement that Eurosport has reached agreement to broadcast the US Open across Europe, excluding the UK and Ireland (where the Discovery owned Pan European sportscaster had historically sub-licensed the rights to Sky), for a further five years.
Amazon’s move is likely to cause further speculation that it is a potential competitor, along with another global tech giant Facebook, in the upcoming Premier League rights auction.
