Rogers holds onto NHL broadcast rights for another 12 years

Rogers Communications Inc. has come to an agreement with the National Hockey League on another 12-year, multi-billion-dollar deal for broadcasting games. Rogers, which owns the Sportsnet brands the games are broadcast on, will hold the national media rights to NHL games on all platforms in Canada through to the 2037-2038 season in a deal worth $11 billion, the company said early Wednesday morning. That will be paid through “escalating annual payments” over 12 years, it said. The news was first reported by sports and business news publication Sportico earlier this week, prior to the announcement by Rogers. The agreement includes national rights across all platforms including TV, digital, and streaming of national regular season games in all languages, Rogers said Wednesday. It also includes national rights to all playoff games, the Stanley Cup Final and all special events, and tentpole events, in all languages. That is in addition to out-of-market rights for all regional games and Rogers being the exclusive category sponsor for the NHL and all NHL tentpole events held in Canada, the company said. When Rogers’ signed its previous 12-year deal for the broadcast and multi-platform rights to NHL games in November 2013 for $5.2 billion, its then-CEO Nadir Mohamed called sports content a “strategic pillar” for the company, and said NHL hockey is “the Holy Grail.” “Two years ago, I said we wanted Sportsnet to be the number one sports media brand in Canada. Today, we’re positioned to do just that,” Mohamed said at a press conference in 2013. Rogers CEO Tony Staffieri said in January, as the company released its annual results for 2024, that the company has “the unique ability to look at the whole ecosystem, from sports ownership all the way to the viewing experience of the consumer — whether it’s in their home or on their mobile device — and we think that’s a huge opportunity for us to capitalize on.” READ MORE: - Rogers buys Bell’s stake in Maple Leaf Sports and Entertainment for $4.7B - Rogers’ purchase of Bell’s MLSE stake not being challenged by Competition Bureau ‘at this time’ Staffieri said in a press release Wednesday that “hockey is Canada’s game and we’re proud to be the home of hockey. Sports are core to our company, and these rights are the most valuable sports rights in Canada.” National Bank of Canada analyst Adam Shine recently observed that in negotiating a new deal, Rogers “was mostly competing against itself and possibly the likes of Amazon, plus maybe other streamers which may not necessarily want anywhere close to the full package of games being made available by the NHL.” Amazon.com, Inc. had previously made a two-year deal with Rogers and the NHL to stream all regular-season Monday night NHL games in English for the 2024-2025 and 2025-2026 seasons — noting it was the first exclusive digital-only streaming deal with the NHL. Rogers said Wednesday that the new agreement allows for the possibility of “strategic sub-licensing for a subset of these rights, including national French-language and a single-night exclusive national package.” hdaley@thewirereport.ca With files from The Wire Report’s archives.

Rogers holds onto NHL broadcast rights for another 12 years

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By Hannah Daley
| April 2, 2025

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Rogers holds onto NHL broadcast rights for another 12 years

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By Hannah Daley
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