US Olympic Broadcast Rights Deal to be Awarded by July

According to the chief rights negotiator for the International Olympic Committee, Richard Carrion, a US broadcast deal covering up to the next four editions of the Olympics should be in place by July.

Among those believed to be in the runnin to become US Olympic rights holder include major broadcasters NBC, Fox and ABC/ESPN, and the deal is likely to be the most lucrative in the history of the Games. The IOC had delayed awarding the US rights for more than a year due to the slump in the advertising market.

Carrion told Reuters: “I suspect we will have a deal in place by (the IOC session in July) in Durban. Our goal is hopefully to have it by then. We are currently in the process of reviewing the contract, updating the contract from 2010-12.”

The current deal with NBC, spanning from 2010-12 for the US Olympic broadcast contract is worth a total of around US$2 billion, but Carrion claimed that for the new deal “we will see an increase”.

He added: “We are still open to the idea (of a four-Games deal). We will listen to their proposals, but it is not something that we are going to demand from them.”

Carrion is one of a small number of candidates to have been suggested as a possible replacement for IOC president Jacques Rogge, who will step down in two years’ time after two terms at the helm, but the rights negotiator played down the speculation: “Let’s just wait. I am very honoured (to be linked with a presidency bid) but let us just wait.”