@Channel7 Signs Olympic Deal

Seven secures long-term partnership with the Olympic Games.

Seven signs all-encompassing agreement for rights across all media platforms for 2016 and 2020 Olympic Games and 2018 Olympic Winter Games.

Seven secures option with International Olympic Committee to extend partnership to 2024.

The Seven Network, Australia’s most-watched broadcast television platform, today confirmed the signing of an historic, long-term agreement for an all-encompassing coverage of the Olympic Games over the coming decade.

Seven’s agreement with the International Olympic Committee delivers free broadcast television and subscription television rights, and expands beyond television to Seven’s digital platforms, including online and Hybrid Broadband Broadcast Television. Seven has also secured radio broadcasting rights.

Under the unprecedented new agreement, Seven will broadcast the Games of the XXXI Olympiad in Rio de Janeiro in 2016, the XXIII Olympic Winter Games in PyeongChang in 2018, the Games of the XXXII Olympiad in Tokyo in 2020, and the Summer Youth Olympic Games in Nanjing in 2014.

Underlining this new partnership is an option which, if exercised, extends the rights to include the XXIV Olympic Winter Games in 2022 and the XXXIII Olympic Games in 2024.

Over the coming decade, Seven will create and deliver the most comprehensive, technologically advanced, multi-platform coverage of the Olympic Games to all Australians on any communications device.

And the company’s commitment to its support of Olympism is evident with Seven’s very first broadcast of this agreement in less than two weeks’ time with a daily highlights package of the 2nd Youth Olympic Games in Nanjing. This commitment to Olympism is not event based but culture and education based, as the company intends to promote the IOC’s ideals based on effort and respect for universal values across all of its platforms.

Kerry Stokes, Chairman of Seven West Media, said: “The Olympic Games has been a key part of Seven’s history and development. I am extraordinarily proud of our long partnership with the IOC and the Olympic movement, and look forward to our partnership with the Olympic Games as we define and build our media presence over the coming decade.”

Tim Worner, CEO of Seven West Media, added: “We accept this honour on behalf of our audiences. The Olympic Games are a commitment to excellence that invigorates us. In many ways, our connection with the Games has defined our business and our connections with our audiences. We are ready to begin the next step on our journey with the Olympic movement and take the responsibility to provide the Games to all Australians across all forms of delivery platforms.

“The Olympic Games is the greatest show on earth. It will be a remarkable platform for Seven as we continue to move forward as a media company, developing new content and building new businesses which will drive our future as Australia’s leading integrated media and communications business. The Olympic Games deliver the biggest audiences and the biggest marketing and advertising partnerships. The marketing of those partnerships with our advertisers begins today. The monetization of our rights begins today. We are expanding our significant online presence and will soon unveil more plans for the further delivery of our video and publishing content across an array of delivery platforms, including the forthcoming launch of Hybrid Broadband Broadcast Television which will allow us to strengthen our broadcast television business and extend to one-on-one communications with our mass audiences.”

“Everyone knows the media landscape is changing at breakneck speed and the way our coverage of these events is produced and distributed across all platforms to all Australians will be revolutionised in the lifetime of this deal. And, if Seven is granted broadcast rights following the exercise of the option for the Games in 2022 and 2024, it will become the longest agreement in Australian Olympic history. We take great pride in our partnership with the Olympic Games and the key role it will play in driving home our leadership across our media platforms and our connection with our audiences. We have projects already earmarked and in development for launch on our television platform following the Olympic Games in Rio in 2016,” Mr Worner said.

Leadership in Sports
Today’s agreement with the International Olympic Games further confirms Seven’s leadership in sports television with the network continuing to dramatically expand its coverage of major sports across its three digital broadcast television channels and accelerate coverage across online, IPTV, HbbTV, mobile and other emerging forms of content delivery.

Seven is focused on delivering the biggest sports events to all Australians. Today’s long-term commitment to the Olympic Games and Olympic Winter Games underlines that commitment.

The agreement with the IOC builds on the National Football League, including the Super Bowl, The US Masters and Wimbledon as major international sports franchises for Seven.

Seven also has all-encompassing agreements for coverage of the Australian Football League Premiership Season, Finals Series, the Grand Final and Brownlow Medal, V8 Supercars including the Bathurst 1000, the Bathurst 12 Hour Endurance Race, all major horse racing events including the Sydney Easter Carnival, the Melbourne Spring Carnival and the Melbourne Cup Carnival, the Sydney-Hobart Yacht Race, all major Australian golf tournaments, all major iron man and triathlon events, and all major tennis tournaments in Australia including The Australian Open and The Davis Cup.

Seven and the Olympic Games
Seven’s commitment to the Olympic Games now spans six decades and represents something of a homecoming. The Olympic Games in Melbourne was our first broadcast. Back then, our coverage involved one outside broadcast truck and three cameras and we moved them from the Olympic Stadium at sunset to the Olympic Swimming Pool to create six hours live coverage each day.

And while technology has undertaken a quantum leap, those first days of television are inextricably linked to our future: building on a partnership with the Olympic movement that has seen us broadcast eleven of the past fourteen Olympiads, a passion for sports and an obligation to bring all Australians every angle, every moment of the greatest event in modern history.

From three cameras in Melbourne to the airfreighting of film from Rome in 1960, videotape and the very early use of satellite from Tokyo in 1964 and finally daily satellite coverage from Mexico in 1968. It’s been a quite a journey and one that continues. Our commitment to live coverage of the Olympic Games came with Munich in 1972 and Montreal in 1976, and in 1980, we pledged our support to the Olympic movement in a challenging international political climate, ensuring and delivering live continuous coverage of the Games with 100 hours of coverage from Moscow.

In 2000, we welcomed the world to Australia as the television network of the Games of the XXVII Olympiad.

In 2006, at the Olympic Winter Games in Torino we acknowledged our 50 year partnership with the International Olympic Committee. And, we weren’t just catering for Australian audiences. Crews from Seven worked in Barcelona, Atlanta, Sydney, Athens and Beijing as an integral partner of the Games global broadcast, producing coverage of major sports
including swimming, diving, water polo and tennis.

Seven has been recognised by the International Olympic Committee as a leader in Olympic Games coverage. In 2008, we were awarded the highest honour – the gold award in the Olympic Golden Rings, a prestigious international competition in which the IOC awards excellence in television coverage of the Olympic Games. Seven’s gold medal came in the most highly-contested category – The Best Olympic Programme – recognising best overall coverage of the Olympic Games in Beijing and was Seven’s third gold award in The Olympic Golden Rings.

Seven was awarded the Golden Ring for Best Olympic Programme for its coverage of the Olympic Winter Games in Torino in 2006 and recognised with gold for its coverage of the Olympic Games in Athens in 2004. Seven has also been recognised in the annual Australian television industry Logie Awards with its coverage of the XXIX Olympiad receiving the highest honour for Most Outstanding Sports Coverage.

The network has also received three Sportel Monaco Podium d’Or Georges Bertelloti Awards for its coverage of the Olympic Games.