Photo: Telemundo Pays $600 Million for World Cup Spanish-Language Broadcast Rights
It has been reported that between Fox and Telemundo, more than $1 billion is being paid for the broadcast rights of the 2016 and 2022 World Cup championships, which Telemundo paying $600 million for the Spanish-language U.S. rights.
Fox beat out ESPN for the English-language rights though ESPN has long invested in the sport, which, while extremely popular worldwide, has failed to garner the fans baseball and American football have in the U.S.
The 2018 World Cup will be held in Russia, and the 2022 games in Qatar.
Univision bought the Spanish-language rights to both the 2010 World Cup in South African and the upcoming 2014 World Cup in Brazil.
While FIFA has not formally announced the winning bids, ESPN released a statement which has many without insider information believing the network was not willing to put up the money required to win.
“We made a disciplined bid that would have been both valuable to FIFA and profitable for our company, while continuing to grow our unprecedented coverage of the World Cup and Women’s World Cup events. We were aggressive while remaining prudent from a business perspective.”
After the 2010 games, Univision reportedly ended up losing $100 million after paying $325 million for the Spanish-rights to the 2010 and 2014 games.
FIFA, the international governing body of association football (soccer), is expected to make an official announcement regarding the broadcast rights Friday afternoon.
