Liberty Media CEO, Derek Chang, is looking for more than just a broadcaster in new US F1 deal.

The current broadcaster in the US is ESPN, a division of Walt Disney Co, and it has held the rights to broadcast F1 in the States since 2018. The previous broadcaster was NBC, who, unwilling to continue paying the $4m annual deal due to low audience figures, backed out.

Desperate to continue broadcasting the sport in its home country Liberty gave F1 to ESPN for free, literally.

But then came the pandemic and lockdowns, which meant a captive audience for Drive to Survive.

Bu 2020 ESPN was paying $5m a year, increasing to $85m a year in 2023.

However, even this wasn't enough for Liberty, consequently the rights are up for sale again, with F1 reportedly seeking between $120m - $150m a year, and while Netflix now appears to have backed down, Apple remains the prime (note what we did there?) contender.

Speaking at a Goldman Sachs conference, Chang made it clear that Liberty is seeking a broadcasting 'partner' just as keen to monetise the sport.

"Is your media partner even just a media partner, or are they also a sponsor?" he said, adding that if they are a sponsor "they have other ways that they're going to monetize and commercialize the relationship".

"Bringing in a partner who amplifies a lot of that for us on an overall holistic basis and driving that engagement with fans is what's important," he added.

It goes without saying that though he didn't name Apple, Liberty is looking at what else the technology giant can bring to the table.

"It's been pretty well-documented in terms of the negotiations, we are pretty far along, and we're pretty happy and comfortable with sort of where we're going to end up," he said. "Hopefully we'll have something to talk about relatively soon."

Meanwhile, ESPN has revealed that 1.2 million viewers tuned in for ESPN2's live broadcast of Sunday's Italian Grand Prix, averaging 484,000 viewers in the 18-49 demographic.

Race are averaging 1.4 million viewers this season across ESPN, ESPN2 and ABC, which is ahead of the all-time series record average of 1.21 million set in 2022.

The Italian Grand Prix's viewership had a 12 percent audience gain over last year's race (1.1 million) and is the largest audience ever for the event on U.S. television,

The ten races this setting viewership records this season were Australia, China, Monaco, Spain, Canada, Austria, Great Britain, Belgium, The Netherlands and Italy, though, perhaps tellingly, the Miami race is currently the only event this season to not have year-on-year viewership growth.

In all honesty even Rachel from Accounts can see the for a population of 340 million, 1.4 is a drop in the ocean, and will drop even lower once whoever wins the broadcast rights starts looking to recoup an investment double what ESPN is currently paying.

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READERS COMMENTS

1. Posted by Editor, 1 hour ago

"@ KKK

We were referring to Liberty in its own country"

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2. Posted by Team Hack, 5 hours ago

"@mds167
"Saw the Prime pun I'm there but had to ask, why wouldn't Amazon'

Well with Amazon being on the inside they probably realise it's not worth it!"

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3. Posted by KKK, 5 hours ago

"In its own country? May I remind media liberty that F1 is NOT American. It never will be, so leave it alone!"

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4. Posted by oldestmike, 6 hours ago

"Not that Liberty gives a SH*T about anyone else, but if they go with APPLE they've lost me."

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5. Posted by mds167, 8 hours ago

"Saw the Prime pun I'm there but had to ask, why wouldn't Amazon with their Prime streaming service be in the running? Amazon are already providing in-race information 'powered byAWS". Broadcasting the event would be an extension of this whereas it is a whole new ball game for Apple.
Then again, they might not be that keen if their Fernando mini series didn't do that well..."

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6. Posted by Superbird70, 8 hours ago

"I think pickleball gets 1.2 million viewers in the USA. Pickleball... Let that sink in."

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7. Posted by dejan, 9 hours ago

"The economics don't work in the US - F1 is at most the 7th or 8th in popularity and might be even outside of the top 10 - with TV and movies you are fighting for a very limited resource which is people's time so Liberty should just give up selling the rights and just sell streaming for a nominal fee to those who want it"

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