Reports surfaced yesterday that the UFC was in talks to purchase, or purchase a controlling interest in, the G4 cable network from NBC Universal. The network currently caters to the gaming and tech community, and reaches some 60 million homes.
Today, Bloomberg reports on some details from the negotiations:
NBC Universal’s G4 channel may fetch as much as $600 million in a sale to Ultimate Fighting Championship, according to analysts including David Joyce of Miller Tabak & Co.
…
Negotiations are early and a deal may not be reached, said the people, who aren’t authorized to speak publicly. Ultimate Fighting Championship’s contract with Viacom Inc. (VIA/B)’s Spike TV ends this year, one of the people said. More broadly distributed cable channels with bigger advertising revenue can fetch as much as $20 per subscriber, Joyce said.
When asked about the deal at today’s (non-streamed) UFC 131 press conference, Dana White noted that no deal was done, and that the UFC was still talking to “everybody.”