Tennis News – IMG Appears To Be Up For Sale

Written by: Staff on 25th February 2013

Tennis News - IMG Appears To Be Up For Sale |

Forstmann Little & Company reportedly has decided to put its sports and modeling talent agency IMG up for sale sooner than expected.

The potential sale has been rumored for months, but it was not expected until later in the spring. However the respected wire service Reuters reported that the agency is now in play and could fetch more than $2 billion in a sale.

Teddy Forstmann, the former chairman of IMG who died in 2011, bought it for somewhere in the range of $700-$750 million in 2004 shortly after the death of IMG founder Mark McCormack, who was a big fan of tennis and gold and who married former WTA player Betsy Nagelson.

IMG has represented a slew of top players and still represents Novak Djokovic and Maria Sharapova. It runs tournaments such as Miami and Stanford, and has sponsor and licensing programs for the Australian Open and Wimbledon. It also has its name on the IMG Bollettieri Tennis Academy in Florida, and has a large broadcasting arm. The company’s IMG College division handles multimedia, marketing, ticket and licensing for more than 200 collegiate properties, including the NCAA.

Back in November, IMG Media agreed to a new three-year deal with the Barclays Premier League (soccer) for airplanes and ships rights, which includes extensive coverage on Sport 24, the 24-hour live sports channel exclusively produced for the airline and cruise industry.

Outside of sports, IMG’s talent division is a big player in the music and fashion worlds, representing superstar models such as Gisele Bundchen, Heidi Klum, and pop star Justin Timberlake.

In a major blow to the tennis side of the company Roger Federer and his agent, Tony Godsick, left IMG when their contracts ran out last June and eventually found their own company.

Then at the end of last year, another big earner for IMG, Rafael Nadal, left the agency with his agent, Carlos Costa.

Reuters says that the decision to shop IMG is being driven by the trustee that runs the estate division of several investment banks including Goldman Sachs, JPMorgan Chase & Co, Morgan Stanley, The Raine Group and Perella Weinberg Partners.

The Hollywood Reporter has stated that IMG might be worth $3 billion and cited insiders who stated that the planned 2013 sale of IMG “is the result of an upcoming cash-out by several investors in a fund that backs the global talent management, television production and licensing firm.”

Variety valued its worth at $2 billion.

The Hollywood Reporter also said that the company is being put for sale because some of its limited partners in one of its funds have investment agreements that are set to expire in June 2013, which would necessitate the sale.

Some of these partners might include Boeing and General Electric’s pension funds, which have economic ties IMG through their investments with Forstmann Little.

It’s possible that a potential buyer might want to break up the company into different pieces.

There were a number of potential buyers listed by Variety and the Hollywood Reporter including rivals CAA and the Wasserman Media Group, tech investment firm Silver Lake, the private equity firm Guggenheim Partners and India’s Reliance.

Reuters mentioned William Morris agency as well as the French media group Lagardere –which also has heavy involvement in tennis – as potential buyers.

Lawyers for Forstmann’s estate have been gradually selling off pieces of his empire and are also attempting to shed it of the health club chain, 24 Hour Fitness.

©Daily Tennis News Wire

Topics: Maria Sharapova, Novak Djokovic, Sports, tennis and IMG, Tennis News