World Courant
Paramount has reduce a deal to dump its Bellator blended martial arts promotion.
The corporate is promoting a majority stake in Bellator to the Skilled Fighters League (PFL), an upstart MMA promotion that was created to tackle the UFC, which is the dominant participant within the area.
The phrases of the deal weren’t disclosed, however earlier reviews had pegged the worth of Bellator at round $500 million. Paramount will retain a minority stake within the mixed firm.
Donn Davis, the founding father of PFL, introduced the acquisition Monday morning, writing that its fighter roster is now equal to that of the UFC, and that it’s going to relaunch the Bellator model subsequent yr.
PFL obtained a considerable funding from Saudi Arabia’s Public Funding Fund earlier this yr, and in addition counts Kevin Hart, Mark Burnett and Wiz Khalifa as minority house owners.
Paramount predecessor Viacom acquired a controlling stake in Bellator again in 2011 at a $50 million value level. The corporate on the time helped launch the UFC through its actuality collection The Final Fighter, an early predecessor to exhibits like Drive to Survive. After Viacom’s Bellator deal, UFC decamped to Fox Sports activities, and extra just lately inked a cope with ESPN. It’s now owned by TKO Group Holdings, which in flip is managed by Endeavor.
Endeavor just lately introduced a brand new UFC occasion in Saudi Arabia, with CEO Ari Emanuel framing it as “a transparent indication that Saudi Arabia has each intention of rising its relationship with the UFC regardless of assumptions made about their current funding within the Skilled Fighters League.”
The sale of Bellator additionally comes as Paramount has sought to exit the fight sports activities enterprise. Final month it introduced that it will shut down Showtime Sports activities and consolidate all sports activities programming inside CBS Sports activities. As a part of that change, it introduced that it will finish its run of televising dwell boxing matches.
Paramount Sells Bellator to PFL – The Hollywood Reporter
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