Attheraces to enter sports rights market
Horse-racing media company launches in-house streaming division as part of plans to work more closely with bookmakers
Attheraces.com (ATR) announced its intention to enter the sports rights market today with the official launch of its in-house streaming division.
Operating under the standalone brand Sports Mediastream, the streaming service is part of a company-wide strategy to strengthen its in-house capabilities.
According to ATR, Sports Mediastream is already streaming around five million live and archive horse race streams every month to 16 partner bookmaker websites in the UK and Ireland, a service which it had previously outsourced to Perform.
However, to further bolster the division, ATR also revealed Sports Mediastream is “ready to sign deals” with rights holders of domestic and international horse racing.
“ATR is committed to growing its business and maximising returns for all its racecourse partners,” Matthew Imi, ATR chief exec, said.
“That’s why continued investment in new services and, particularly, in opportunities to work more directly with our multiple bookmaker partners is very important to us.
“We are very excited by the official launch of Sport Mediastream, the success of the platform to date and the prospect of working with other sports rights owners looking to maximise the potential of their assets in this fast developing area of business,” he added.
In November ATR, which is part-owned by Sky, also brought its price comparison service in-house after an outsourcing arrangement with easyodds was mutually terminated.
Racecourse group Arena Racing Company holds a 48% shareholding in ATR while Sky commands a 46% stake.