Each report about Versant shopping SportsEngine has come with the caveat that a sale is not guaranteed.
An executive for Comcast’s new cable network spinoff company gave credence to that with recent comments.
Here’s what USA Sports President Matt Hong — who oversees Versant’s sports media rights — said at an SBJ event (via Sports Media Watch) about the company’s digital properties:
“I think where you’ll see us invest more and more are those digital businesses. So we’ll obviously continue to invest in our current sports programming; we’ll look for more top shelf sports programming. But in terms of where we’re trying to go and where we want our future revenues to come from, it’ll be those digital businesses that are synergistic to our sports programming.”
He also added:
“That’s the model for the rest of Versant: to continue to invest in the core business — which is television, which is linear television and sports programming — but to grow the adjacent businesses so that the mix of revenue is much more like the golf vertical. … We feel like we’ve got a pretty good plan for growing these adjacent businesses, these digital businesses that are adjacent to our current television businesses.”
Versant has hired Lazard to explore a SportsEngine sale; a valuation of $400M to $500M was floated in a recent Bloomberg report.
Hong spoke specifically about Versant’s golf portfolio and the 50-50 revenue balance it has struck between Golf Network and the GolfNow course booking platform.
Obviously the synergies there are more straightforward than a youth sports-focused business.
This still feels like a jump ball.
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