CCTV Locks Down Olympic TV Rights in China Through 2024

(ATR) CCTV is putting itself in position to benefit if the Olympics come back to China in 2022.

The state broadcaster of China will carry the Games in the country through 2024 under a deal announced Thursday by the IOC.

"On behalf of the IOC, I am delighted that we will continue to work with our longstanding broadcast partner CCTV," said IOC president Thomas Bach in a release.

"They have demonstrated many times their ability to bring first class coverage of the Olympic Games to hundreds of millions of Chinese people. The revenue the IOC has secured from this agreement will be redistributed to support future organizers of the Olympic Games, as well as supporting sport and athletes in China and around the world."

CCTV president Hu Zhanfan called it "a win-win agreement" and said his company is "determined to to be, as always, a powerful and exceptional partner of the IOC."

At $550 million, the deal more triples the previous contract for the Olympic TV rights in China, a $160 million dollar deal that covered the 2014 and 2016 Olympics, also with CCTV. The new agreement covers the 2018 Winter Olympics in PyeongChang, the 2020 Summer Olympics in Tokyo, and the 2022 and 2024 Olympics, neither of which has a host yet.

The Chinese Olympic rights were previously sold for $100 million in a deal covering 2010 and 2012. Prior to that, the 2006 Torino and 2008 Beijing Olympics were sold for a now-bargain of $17.5 million to an Asian broadcasting consortium.

Beijing and Almaty, Kazakhstan are the two finalists to host the 2022 Winter Olympics. The deal could pay off big for CCTV if Beijing’s bid is victorious at next year’s IOC Session in Kuala Lumpur.

Written by Nick Devlin

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