Internet giant Amazon will add coverage of the French Open to its budding live tennis portfolio after securing one of the clay-court grand slam’s two domestic rights packages for three years from 2021.
Amazon has purchased package two, which includes matches played on the newly-built Simonne-Mathieu court and night sessions on the Philippe-Chatrier court, Roland-Garros’ centrepiece venue.
The streaming service will also have the rights to magazine programming to support its live coverage, as well as daily highlights throughout the tournament.
Amazon’s Prime Video subscribers will be able to watch the coverage at no extra cost to their membership.
“Prime Video is focused on bringing our French customers a great selection of high-quality entertainment and now we are adding live sports on top of all the great series and movies they can already enjoy as part of their Prime membership,” said Alex Green, Prime Video’s European managing director of sport.
“We are thrilled to be offering Prime members in France coverage of such an iconic event, their favourite tennis Grand Slam of the year. We are excited by the new Roland-Garros night sessions, which we think will be among the year’s top sporting moments.”
The main package has been picked up by French public broadcaster France Televisions, which will have exclusive coverage of all tournament matches except for those played on the Simonne-Mathieu court and night sessions.
Amazon and France Televisions will both have coverage of the semi-finals and final.
The agreement ensures that France Televisions will continue its longstanding partnership with the French Tennis Federation (FFT), which it has had a relationship with for more than 30 years. Discovery-owned broadcaster Eurosport, meanwhile, will lose its French Open coverage in France after next year.
Delphine Ernotte Cunci, president of France Televisions, said she was “very happy” that the French Open would remain “in the crown of public service”, adding that the broadcaster’s new deal “consolidates its commitment” to French Sport.
The deal was hailed as a major success by the FFT, which said the revenue it will receive from its domestic rights for the period from 2021 to 2023 is up 25 per cent compared to the average over the previous three years.
Referencing the entry of Amazon, the FFT said in an official release that it packaged the rights ‘in an innovative way’ so that it could ‘adapt Roland-Garros’ broadcasting methods to the changes in media consumption’ to enable the tournament to ‘reach a new audience’.
Amazon has put tennis at the heart of its move into live sports, most recently adding UK coverage of the Women’s Tennis Association (WTA) to an offering in the country that already includes the men’s ATP World Tour. The streaming service also has rights in the UK to the US Open grand slam.
Internet giant Amazon will add coverage of the French Open to its budding live tennis portfolio after securing one of the clay-court grand slam’s two domestic rights packages for three years from 2021.
Amazon has purchased package two, which includes matches played on the newly-built Simonne-Mathieu court and night sessions on the Philippe-Chatrier court, Roland-Garros’ centrepiece venue.
The streaming service will also have the rights to magazine programming to support its live coverage, as well as daily highlights throughout the tournament.
Amazon’s Prime Video subscribers will be able to watch the coverage at no extra cost to their membership.
“Prime Video is focused on bringing our French customers a great selection of high-quality entertainment and now we are adding live sports on top of all the great series and movies they can already enjoy as part of their Prime membership,” said Alex Green, Prime Video’s European managing director of sport.
“We are thrilled to be offering Prime members in France coverage of such an iconic event, their favourite tennis Grand Slam of the year. We are excited by the new Roland-Garros night sessions, which we think will be among the year’s top sporting moments.”
The main package has been picked up by French public broadcaster France Televisions, which will have exclusive coverage of all tournament matches except for those played on the Simonne-Mathieu court and night sessions.
Amazon and France Televisions will both have coverage of the semi-finals and final.
The agreement ensures that France Televisions will continue its longstanding partnership with the French Tennis Federation (FFT), which it has had a relationship with for more than 30 years. Discovery-owned broadcaster Eurosport, meanwhile, will lose its French Open coverage after next year.
Delphine Ernotte Cunci, president of the France Télévisions, said she was “very happy” that the French Open would remain “in the crown of public service”, adding that the broadcaster’s new deal “consolidates its commitment” to French Sport.
The deal was hailed as a major success by the French Tennis Federation (FFT), which said the revenue it will receive from its domestic rights for the period from 2021 to 2023 is up 25 per cent compared to the average over the previous three years.
Referencing the entry of Amazon, the FFT said in an official release that it packaged the rights ‘in an innovative way’ so that it could ‘adapt Roland-Garros’ broadcasting methods to the changes in media consumption’ and ‘reach a new audience’.
Amazon has put tennis at the heart of its move into live sports, most recently adding UK coverage of the Women’s Tennis Association (WTA) to an offering in the country that already includes the men’s ATP World Tour. The streaming service also has rights in the UK to the US Open grand slam.
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