A very big development for the UFC is announced by Five Ounces of Pain:
FiveOuncesofPain.com has recently received reports from multiple sources extremely close to the situation indicating that the UFC has recently sold a minority percentage of the company to Sheik Tahnoon Bin Zayed Al Nahyan, the son of the former United Arab Emirates president Sheikh Zayed bin Sultan Al Nahyan.
Sheik Tahnoon is well known throughout the grappling community as the founder of the no-gi submission Olympics, the Abu Dhabi Combat Club. Himself a Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu black belt under Renzo Gracie, Shiek Tahnoon has been a long time supporter and practitioner of Jiu-Jitsu.
They go on to explain that the deal has been worked on for quite some time, even tying some old tweets from Dana back into the story (for example: In morocco to bust lee murray out!!!!! ).
It also turns out that Sheik Tahnoon’s BJJ instructor had a lot to do with the deal getting done:
5 Oz. has been further notified by several sources that have indicated that Sheik Tahnoon’s Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu instructor, Renzo Gracie, played a key role in brokering the deal between the two parties. We have been further informed that key components of the deal included Gracie’s signing by the UFC, along with the Renzo’s participation against Matt Hughes in Abu Dhabi.
All we know right now is that the sale was a minority stake, not the full percentage nor do we know if Sheik Tahnoon will have any involvement in any of the day-to-day operations of the promotion.
More details are likely to emerge in the coming days and Bloody Elbow will be here to bring them to you.