The German Bundesliga has negotiated a TV deal that will generate an increase of more than 50 percent for rights to league matches.
A four-year deal announced Tuesday starts with the2013-14 season and runs to 2016-17. It leaves the main players unchanged, with Sky television keeping the live broadcast rights and ARD public television retaining the highlights rights. The leaguesaid the deal will bring in about 2.5 billion euros ($3.3 billion) in total. That amounts to about 628 million euros per year on average, compared with 412 million euros under the currrentarrangement.
Sky Deutschland added live broadband Internet television and mobile rights to the live pay TV broadcasting package for the top two divisions it already held, and said it willpay an average 485.7 million euros per year. League chief executive Christian Seifert said the agreement means “the clubs have more economic room for maneuver than everbefore.”
Bayern Munich also welcomed the agreement. The increase in income is “a milestone in the history of the Bundesliga,” said Bayern chairman Karl-HeinzRummenigge.