Saying “it’s stupid to negotiate in a recession”, IOC President Jacques Rogge said the IOC may delay bidding for U.S. broadcast rights to the 2010 Winter Games. He added, “we’ll wait for the economy to revive”.
Although Olympic officials previously said they might sign broadcasting agreements for the 2010 Winter Games and the 2012 Summer Games as early as this year, Rooge now says U.S. broadcast rights for those Olympics may not be awarded until 2005.
General Electric Co.’s NBC has broadcast every Summer Olympics since 1988 and owns the U.S. television rights to all Games through 2008, including next month’s Games.
In 1995 NBC paid a total of $2.3 billion for the U.S. broadcast rights to the 2004 and 2008 Summer Games and the 2006 Winter Games.
When NBC purchased the rights to three Olympics in 1995, no other U.S. network was allowed to bid on those Games in order to keep the talks in Lausanne secret.
Rogge said the bidding process will be more open next time. “I want to make it fair to the competition”, he said.
Rogge recently met with executives from Viacom Inc.’s CBS, who said they’re interested in bidding for the 2010 and 2012 Games. He said he also plans to meet with officials from Walt Disney Co.’s ABC and News Corp.’s Fox.
Even though NBC’s broadcast of the 2000 Games in Sydney drew and lowest Summer Olympic ratings in at least 30 years, the Games remain one of the most watched sports events in the world.
