Eurosport snaps up Olympics coverage in billion-euro deal

EUROSPORT’S parent company Discovery has won the European rights to broadcast the Olympic Games from 2022. The deal, which cost the cable TV broadcaster €1.3 billion, has seen the BBC and other public broadcasters in Europe lose control of what they’ll be able to show of future games.

With the exception of Britain and France, Discovery now has the rights to summer and winter games from 2018 onwards. The BBC had already signed a deal to cover the 2018 Winter Olympics in Pyeongchang and the 2020 summer games in Tokyo. But beyond Japan, the BBC will no longer be the home of the Olympics on British TV.

The BBC and other broadcasters, such as RTVE, which usually provides Olympics coverage for Spanish audiences, will be able to negotiate subcontracts to show parts of the world’s biggest sporting event. And under current legislation, Discovery will be required to show the games almost in their entirety for free.

Discovery Chief Executive David Zaslav told The Guardian newspaper: “We understand the great legacy of Olympic programming across Europe and we have great respect for the quality of content produced by the BBC, by French TV and German TV. Now we have the exclusive rights to the Olympics on every platform, we’ll begin discussions with all the different players in every market.”