Sky Media to sell BT Sport advertising inventory

Thursday 2 July 2020

Sky Media will now sell advertisements and sponsorship for BT Sport

BT and Sky have agreed a new multi-year partnership that broadens and deepens their strong commercial relationship. Sky Media, the advertising sales arm of Sky, will now sell advertisements and sponsorship across all BT Sport channels in the UK.

Following a competitive tender process, BT Sport have awarded their advertising sales contract to Sky Media, who will replace Channel 4. The agreement means that Sky Media will exclusively sell advertisements and sponsorship across both residential and commercial feeds of all BT Sport channels in the UK as well as the BT Sport app and website.

Sky Media currently represents all of Sky’s channels and also sells on behalf of a range of major broadcasters and channels including Channel 5, Viacom and Discovery.

Andy Haworth, Managing Director, BT Sport said, “Channel 4 have been a great partner who have been with us since launch and have helped us become the established business we are today. I would like to thank them for all of their hard work and support.”

“We are excited to be forging a new partnership with the Sky Media team, whose expertise in the sport market stood out, we are excited about the new opportunities this will bring and look forward to working together.”

Patrick Behar, Chief Business Officer, Sky said: “This new agreement between BT Sport and Sky Media is just another step forward in deepening the longstanding partnership between BT and Sky. From rolling out our world-class entertainment on BT TV through our NOW TV service, and reaching a deal to offer both parties’ sports offerings in one place earlier this year, our relationship is going from strength to strength. This latest agreement is another perfect fit for both of us and it will mean Sky Media can offer clients all the best sports advertising available in the UK, in one place.”

This deal follows the content deal agreed between the two media firms in 2017, which allowed Sky customers to add BT Sport to their Sky subscriptions and BT TV customers to access NOW TV content on their set-top boxes for the first time, earlier this year.

Notes to editors

  • BT Sport channels refer to BT Sport 1, BT Sport 2, BT Sport 3, BT Sport/ESPN, BT Sport 1 HD, BT Sport 2 HD, BT Sport 3 HD, BT Sport/ESPN HD and BT Sport Ultimate
  • Sky Media have exclusive rights to negotiate and conclude the sale of advertisements and sponsorship across linear, out of home and DAI (Dynamic Ad Insertion) for the BT Sport app and website, for all BT Sport channels in the UK, from 1st September 2020

For further information

Jack Bates, Corporate Communications Manager: jack.bates@sky.uk

BT Group Newsroom: 020 7356 5369 or from outside the UK: + 44 20 7356 5369

About BT Sport

Launched in 2013, BT Sport broadcasts in the UK and Republic of Ireland with around five million subscribers. BT Sport offers five linear TV channels BT Sport 1, BT Sport 2, BT Sport 3, BT Sport

ESPN, BT Sport 4K UHD, six interactive BT Sport Extra channels and is available on BT TV, Sky,

Virgin and Talk Talk. BT Sport is also available online and via the App on mobile and large screen devices and operates pay per view channel, BT Sport Box Office. BT Sport has a track record of innovation, operating from one of industry’s most sophisticated sports TV studios, and delivering world-firsts around Virtual Reality, Dolby Atmos, 4K UHD and remote production. Its achievements have been recognized with awards from IBC, Promax, Music Week and more.

As well as being the sole UK rights holder for all of the UEFA Champions League and UEFA Europa League, BT Sport offers live sport programming including the English Premier League, Emirates FA Cup, boxing, FA WSL, Gallagher Premiership Rugby, Heineken Champions Cup and MotoGP.

BT’s purpose is to use the power of communications to make a better world. It is one of the world’s leading providers of communications services and solutions, serving customers in 180 countries. Its principal activities include the provision of networked IT services globally; local, national and international telecommunications services to its customers for use at home, at work and on the move; broadband, TV and internet products and services; and converged fixed-mobile products and services. BT consists of four customer-facing units: Consumer, Enterprise, Global and Openreach.

For the year ended 31 March 2020, BT Group’s reported revenue was £22,905m with reported profit before taxation of £2,353m.

British Telecommunications plc (BT) is a wholly-owned subsidiary of BT Group plc and encompasses virtually all businesses and assets of the BT Group. BT Group plc is listed on the London stock exchange.

For more information, visit www.btplc.com

About Sky

With 24 million customers across seven countries, Sky is Europe’s leading media and entertainment company and is proud to be part of the Comcast group. Our 32,000 employees help connect our customers to the very best entertainment, sports, news, arts and to our own local, original content.

Following the success of Sky originals like Chernobyl, we plan to double our investment in original content by 2024. We’re also developing a new TV and movie studio, Sky Studios Elstree, which is expected to lead to the creation of over 2,000 new jobs and generate an additional £3 billion of production investment in UK creative sector in the first five years alone.

Our technology allows customers to watch what they want, when they want, how they want, and as we connect millions of families to content they love, we believe it is our responsibility to do it safely. That’s why we offer services like Sky Broadband Buddy and the Sky Kids app. And our online streaming service, NOW TV, brings viewers all the enjoyment of Sky with the flexibility of a contract-free service.

We also believe that a company of our scale has a responsibility that goes beyond our business, and into the community. We recently announced a series of commitments to help tackle racial injustice and improve diversity and inclusion. To ensure the commitments are delivered, Sky will invest £10million per year across its markets for each of the next three years. We’re committed to being Europe’s first net zero carbon entertainment company by 2030 – two decades before we have to – and we’re an inclusive employer recognised by The Times and Stonewall for our commitment to diversity.