Friday, September 12, 2014

WWE finally announces India TV Rights Deal.


WWE has been talking about this thing for a long time.

A year ago, WWE set out the goal that "over the next 18 months we expect to renegotiate our four largest television agreements in the U.S., the UK and India."

And they've done it. All those agreements have been completed (along with ones in Canada, France, the Middle East, Germany, AustriaThailand)

At the last conference Call Safalow tried to push them for details but they wouldn't say...

Brad Safalow - PAA Research
Thanks. Just a couple of follow-ups. One, what is the status of the TV rights negotiation in India.
George Barrios - Chief Strategy & Financial Officer
We are still working through the deal with our partner. Obviously we’ve agreed to terms where we’re working through the final point.
Brad Safalow - PAA Research
Okay. So is that something you actually will communicate kind of what you have in the past or suggested on the mark-to-market.
George Barrios - Chief Strategy & Financial Officer
That we would communicate when the deal is signed.
Brad Safalow - PAA Research
Well, you obviously always communicate with the deal signed, but give us a sense of like how much the increase was.
George Barrios - Chief Strategy & Financial Officer
Yes we never talk about that. We’ve already communicated kind of the total increase of our major deal. So that will probably be the extent of it. We don’t get into the individual deals that we are in.
Back in May WWE said, "Our content licensing agreements as far as India is concerned, we’re in the middle of negotiations there, which should be big for us."

In February, the company had noted, "Additionally, we like to be aware that we are currently in similar discussions in India, where our analysis also indicate significant economic upside. Each of these developments represent significant milestones in our effort to realize greater value from our content and transform our business."

I'm curious what the "new one-hour fully customized version of Raw tailored specifically for the Indian audience" will involve and how profitable bringing "WWE live events back to India in 2015" will end up being.

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