ATP Announces Overtime Deal, Positioning for Commercial Merger with WTA

ATP Announces Overtime Deal, Positioning for Commercial Merger with WTA

The Association of Tennis Professionals (ATP) announced a new content partnership with Overtime this week. The organization behind tennis’ top men’s tour is hoping the collaboration will spur interest and engagement, and expand its reach, amongst millennial and Gen-Z fans.

“We want to focus more heavily on [social media and cultivating fandom with] the younger generation,” Massimo Calvelli (CEO, ATP Tour) said. And “that is [Overtime’s] bread and butter.”

Converting a meaningful percentage of casual next-gen tennis fans into avids will lift ATP revenues and position the Tour for longer-term success. But the greatest unlock of value, both in the short term and over the long-haul, exists in a commercial merger with the Women’s Tennis Association (WTA).  

If the two circuits were fully aligned in how they went about monetizing their rights, they could “replace millions with billions fairly quickly,” Calvelli said. “It’s the single biggest priority we [at the ATP] have right now.”

Tennis has a large global audience. The ATP estimates more than one billion people follow the sport worldwide.

“In terms of overall number of fans, depending on how you look at it, [that is] 4th [or] 5th [most globally],” Calvelli said.

For context, golf is said to have 450mm fans.

The Tour season also runs nearly the entirety of the calendar year. So, the ATP has an abundance of live content to sell to media rights holders.

And yet, the amount of media rights revenue it commands pales in comparison to other properties. ATP Media reportedly generated ~$200 million in 2023, roughly a quarter of the $763mm the PGA Tour is said to have attributed to media rights in ’22.

Something is clearly off. 

“For me, [the historic member-centric approach taken], has been one of the [main problems],” Calvelli said, particularly in the U.S.

The ATP has long marketed itself as being equally representative of both the players and tournaments. It’s never tacitly tried to appease the sport’s fans or engage that audience.

But the former Nike, Wilson Sporting Goods, and Amer Sports Group executive is convinced the organization will deliver the most value to its members if it puts the fans first.

“If fans are happy, they buy more tickets or spend more on tickets, they buy merchandise, they consume [content] on social media, they [stream the sport] on OTT platforms,” Cavelli said. “All of that creates value, and that value can be redistributed to [our members].”

So, he has been working to alter the ATP’s North Star. The organization’s revamped focus —formally called ‘One Vision’— has led to ‘the most radical set of reforms that the Tour has experienced since its inception’ (think: tournament formats, player compensation).

The ATP has also tripled sponsorship revenues and created a new affiliated business entity, Tennis Data Innovation, that focuses on maximizing the value of Tour data rights within the last four years

But ATP Media has not enjoyed as much success growing the value of the Tour’s media rights over that period.

“The transition from linear to digital is not an easy one to crack,” Cavelli said. “If we’re not willing to take risks and try new things [moving forward], there is danger [in revenues falling further].”

That does not mean ATP events are imminently headed to social or streaming channels.

“We’re still a ways from that,” Cavelli said. 

Internal power struggles over the rights to live match inventory still need to be worked through.

However, the ATP is trying to reposition itself ahead of its upcoming rights negotiations.

The organization unveiled a ‘transformative global marketing campaign’ in January. Its creative has a different tone than campaigns of the past.

It’s “edgy, it’s dynamic, it’s energetic,” Calvelli said.

The ATP is also taking a new social-first approach to non-live content. Historically, it would simply populate those channels with programming leftover from broadcast.

The new roadmap prioritizes building out a formal influencer marketing program and increasing the number of collaborations it does on-site with content creators.

The Overtime partnership addresses both initiatives. 

“Ultimately, [the digital media co. is] going to have their own team, they're going to involve influencers, and they're going to distribute [the content captured at ATP events] through the new tennis vertical that they're launching,” Calvelli said.

Overtime recently announced a similar amplification partnership with the NWSL. 

The ATP has been flirting with Overtime for years. It finally got the confidence –and support– to make a move after fan and brand research efforts supported leadership’s intuitions.

Overtime has “110 million followers, most of them [North American] millennials or Gen Zs,” Calvelli said. “These guys are [also] new thinkers. They come at [social media with] a completely different approach and know exactly what needs to be done to [reach] the demographic that we want to [speak to].”

While the ATP is ramping up efforts to engage younger fans, it has no intention of neglecting or abandoning its older, existing audience. It simply understands the need to serve both.

Calvelli acknowledges that none of this is revolutionary. However, the efforts are all part of a cohesive, multi-dimensional strategy for the first time, and the expectation is that alone will lead to revenue growth and expansion of the fan base.

But nothing would unlock more value for ATP members than a commercial merger with the WTA (and CVC-backed WTA Ventures).

It would be “transformational,” Calvelli said. “The biggest change the sport has seen in 50 years.”

As it stands, there are four entities across the ATP and WTA commercializing the Tours’ rights. That’s not just problematic from a cost or efficiency perspective, they oftentimes compete with one another over finite resources (think: available media or sponsorship dollars).

It also makes it challenging for prospective partners to invest across the entirety of the tennis landscape (think: multiple contracts needed). 

Having a single aligned commercial entity negotiating on behalf of the two otherwise independent organizations would enable both to maximize the value of their respective assets/rights.

“It’s very hard to come up with a logical argument [against a commercial merger],” Calvelli said.

But like with anything else, there are folks determined to protect the legacy of, or their role in, the establishment. And as such, while discussions are progressing, they’re not moving as fast as either side would like. 

There is a soft deadline of sorts for a deal to be consummated. The ATP can align media rights in some of its key media markets and renegotiate their sale come Jan. 1, 2026. 

If the ATP and WTA can’t get Tennis Ventures formally up and running by then, look for the two sides to ‘softly align’ and negotiate their individual packages together in select markets (think: Sky Sports in Italy, UK, and Germany). And then continue to work on a broader partnership together.

“If we keep the structure that we have now, we will [never] get [to the billion dollar a year deals other sports enjoy],” Calvelli said.

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