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TEN confirms Winter Olympics 2014

TEN wins the rights to the Winter Olympics in Sochi next February.

2013-05-14_0735TEN has confirmed it has secured the rights to the XXII Olympic Winter Games in Sochi, Russia, in 2014.

The deal with the International Olympic Committe includes the rights across all broadcast platforms: free-to-air television, subscription television, internet and mobile phone.

TEN CEO Hamish McLennan, said: “We are delighted that TEN will be Australia’s Olympics network in 2014.

“The agreement with the IOC delivers on our strategy to increase our investment in premium sport.

“Australia will field its largest-ever Winter Olympics team at Sochi and we are confident that some of those 56 athletes will be among the Games’ star performers.

“We are also confident that Australian viewers and advertisers will embrace our coverage of the Sochi Games.”

Rights to the Summer 2016 Games in Rio are yet to be finalised.

IOC President Jacques Rogge said: “Sochi 2014 will be the first Olympic Winter Games held in Russia, and sports fans around the world will be tuning in to follow the very best of Olympic winter sport next February. Australia is a sports-loving nation with passionate Olympic fans, and therefore we are very pleased to be able to announce this agreement with Ten to ensure fantastic broadcast coverage of the Olympic Winter Games.”

IOC Finance Commission Chairman Richard Carrión, who led the negotiations, said: “Ten is an experienced sports broadcaster with a clear passion for the Olympic Games. The agreement ensures there will be extensive free television coverage of next year’s Olympic Winter Games, as well as the very best broadcast coverage on other media platforms, including online and mobile.”

Australian Olympic Committee President, John Coates, said: “On behalf of our Winter sports, we are excited to be working with Network Ten. This is great news for our Winter athletes who continue to excel on the world stage, particularly in aerials, moguls, snowboard halfpipe, snowboard cross and the new discipline of slopestyle. We are aiming to be a top 15 nation on the medal tally in Sochi.”

23 Responses

  1. @BigVic
    Agree and Ten is almost set to win the cricket and with MotoGP, F1 and V8 Supercars up for renewal I suspect they will get hold of it or renew it

  2. Good to see TEN on the rebound and investing in premium sports such as the Olympics after missing out on the NRL and A-League rights. They’ve got Rugby but with the Olympics, I can see 2014 as the year TEN rebounds.

  3. Assuming your ancient television rules don’t prevent it Ten would probably be wise to try and hold on to it exclusively as with the Winter Olympics, plus taking in to account of the time difference, they can probably do a decent job just on Ten and One HD as generally speaking there are only a small number of events taking place simultaneously in comparison to the Summer games.

  4. This is good news for Ten but they need to be really smart with where they position it. One hd must be used to it’s full potential so we can see premium sports in Hd.

  5. @josh777 I didn’t know that Foxtel’s coverage got nominations at their own club best-and-fairest night (the ASTRAS), but I was pleased to see that they won the peer-voted Most Outstanding Sports Coverage award at the Logies this year. I’m with you – It would be a travesty if Foxtel don’t do these games, after making us get used to it with Vancouver and London.

  6. Let’s not get too excited.

    No other network thought that the Winter Olympics were worth the money.

    Somehow I think it’s going to take a little more than a couple of weeks of skiing and skating to revive the corpse that is the TEN network.

  7. I hope that Network Ten dont stuff this up. When the old admin was kicked out and the new admin at Ten came into power they changed Ten’s strategy, yes the Sports channel strategy was handled poorly and timed poorly but it was a good strategy nonetheless. Then the new admin sold of most of the sport and had a hand in stuffing what little events they did have, NBL Netball Swimming etc. They didnt get the A league and the Rugby League. NOw they have bought the rights to Winter Olympics which usually dont rate well. However that is not really the point the point is that since the admin change Ten’s reputation as a network which can treat a sport and its fans with respect has gone down the crapper. These rights to Sochi will give them a chance at redemption. HOwever i dont hold out much hope for that. At least the rights were cheap and they will probably on sell some of it to FOXtel to make back some of the money spent. I hope they do this well but am not holdin my breath, at least they have another chance.

  8. This could be the huge leg-up One has needed to become a decent multichannel. If there are Australians with medal hopes it will deliver guarantees audiences and there are other sports that are really exciting to watch as they’re quite extreme. I could def see One coming out of this much stronger as a sports-heavy (but no sports exclusive) young male multi-channel (like 7mate but more sporty).

  9. Nine’s @l^mp!cs was the same as FTA coverage has always been, and always will be. There are hundreds of events an only one channel and the whole points is the massive number ads needed to fund it.

    Foxtel’s coverage was exhaustive but many of the commentators were dreadful and there was a lot of dead air and filling broadcast inbetween events. They gave it away, their average audience was around 600k (spread over 8 channels) and they lost $50m.

    Nine’s coverage dominated the ratings get 2m+ viewers for over a fortnight and pretty much smothered Ten to death, which they are still to recover from. Nine lost $20m but only because advertising revenues had halved since they paid too much for the rights package.

    Most people don’t watch the @l^mp!cs for the sport, they want to be part of the spectacle and the event. The IOC know this which is why they make billions marketing it.

  10. I agree this can be good for TEN but they need to have most of the coverage on ONE and ch11, leaving nightly highlights on TEN. Selling off some non exclusive rights to Foxtel would be good as well.

    We know the numbers won’t be huge but it will give TEN some creditability especially if the bulk is shown on ONE in HD, including simulcasting the opening and closing on ONE and TEN.

  11. This needs to be a digital channel exclusive, if ten didicate their main channel to it it will become another Delhi 2010, which was arguably the beginning of the end for ten. but if this elevates ONE and 11 get monster shares it could be a really good thing for them.

  12. looks like another nail in the coffin for ten. the winter Olympics, seriously? why bother foxtel will have 24582392 channels dedicated to it, the winter games are the annoying little sister of the summer games. people only watch because there is a higher chance someone will die.

  13. @ slam – I hope your wrong as Foxtel’s Olympic and Commonwealth coverage is well worth every cent and for them to not cover Sochi because of a loss on the London games (which by the way I believe was the first games they included in the Sports pack and didn’t charge extra – possibly causing the loss) would be a mistake. Not to mention following the award nominations they have received at this years ASTRAs for their London coverage (and I believe they have won awards already for their coverage but not completely sure) it would be social suicide to get all that praise and then say “eh it’s not worth it”.

  14. Here’s hoping that Ten do make a better stab at this than Nine’s atrocious 2012 coverage, and that they learn from Nine’s mistakes.
    I hope they utilise (or are permitted to utilise) One and Eleven to show more coverage, employ specialist commentators and proficient presenters, and don’t use the event to show relentless ads for upcoming shows.

    I have some hopes that they will do better though, Ten’s coverage of the 2007 Rugby World Cup, while still not comprehensive, was head and shoulders above Nine’s diabolical treatment of the 2011 event.

  15. @BarrieT- not sure you’ll be seeing this one on Foxtel. Ten statement this morning confirms the agreement covers all broadcast platforms (inclusive of subscription TV). Foxtel will need to buy in and it doesn’t appear they have the appetite for it after the financial burn of London.

    10 channels was great for the viewer, but the cost indicates this is not a sustainable ongoing model for broadcasting such events

  16. I’m not sure how well this will do- Ten had the Commonwealth games which failed to rate after all, and Australia generally doesn’t have a lot of representation at the winter games…

  17. I hope they have 24/7 coverage on One with the big Australian events also on the main channel. It can’t rate any worse than what they’re currently showing….

  18. Should work for Ten…us being 6 hours ahead in time might give Ten some solid events live in primetime.And there are winter events that have a certain cool factor about them..snowboarding,freestyle skiing..that appeal to the demographics they’re after.Can they somehow springboard off these games,like seven does with tennis is the unknown.

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