Nine walks away from Australian Open deal

Channel Nine has failed to secure the broadcast rights for the Australian Open tennis this summer from rival Seven West Media.

The two networks have been in discussions about whether Seven would sell the rights to its final year of tennis to rival Nine.

According to Fairfax, Nine’s offer represented a $10m premium on Seven’s current deal with Tennis Australia, which is worth about $40m a year.

The Sydney Morning Herald reported that Seven wanted nearer to $60 million a year, which is the amount Nine paid for the 2020-2024 seasons of tennis.

Nine Entertainment Co chief executive, Hugh Marks, said a fair offer was rejected by Seven.

“We haven’t been able to get to an agreement,” the Nine Entertainment Co chief executive, Hugh Marks, told Fairfax Media.

“Obviously, we will have a significant cost-saving this year with no cricket or tennis, but we will be spending a fairly significant part of that cost-saving on new programming,” he said.

“We’ve decided that we are going to take the opportunity to commission some additional local programming, which is both an investment in the schedule for next year plus the overall schedule for the future because we get to try a number of things which may or may not succeed.”