SURJ Sports Investment, a branch of Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund (PIF), is in the running to purchase a stake in EuroLeague, Europe’s professional league in basketball, according to the Financial Times (FT).
SURJ would be investing in tandem with an American private-equity firm, General Atlantic, whose sportiest investments are in Authentic Brands Group (ABG) and the DTC gymwear brand Gymshark.
SURJ and General Atlantic have competition in the form of British firm BC Partners, whose website suggests a private-equity portfolio devoid of sports properties. According to the FT, however, this past August the firm “provided capital […] in the form of new preferred equity and debt” to the sports talent and marketing agency GSE Worldwide.
The shareholders in EuroLeague Commercial Assets, which owns both EuroLeague and EuroCup, wish to sell off about one-third of the company, which is worth about €1 billion. They have engaged the investment bank LionTree for the purpose. According to the FT’s sources, negotiations have reached a late stage but not yet produced a deal.
PIF established SURJ, in the summer of last year, with a view toward expanding the sports sector in Saudi Arabia as well as in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA). It quickly signed a sponsorship deal with Al-Ittihad football club and then acquired a minority stake in the Professional Fights League (PFL), with a pledge to invest in the league’s forthcoming regional league, PFL MENA. The PFL is the second-biggest league in mixed martial arts (MMA), after the Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC).
