NBCU figuring on $1.2 billion from Olympics

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Comcast and NBCUNBC Universal will receive about $1.2 billion in total revenue from the London Olympics, moving closer to breaking even on the games. It paid about $1.18 billion for rights. The company is spending about $100 million on production, estimates David Joyce, an analyst at Miller Tabak & Co. in New York told Bloomberg. He had expected the network to lose $100 million to $200 million on the games.


National broadcast and cable sales will deliver about $1 billion, with local TV and digital contributing another $200 million, Comcast CEO Brian Roberts said in an interview on CNBC: “It’s better than we thought. It’s a good start and now we just have to, you know, make it all happen in the next 17 days.”

The figure includes ad sales across NBCU platforms that are airing the London Olympics: NBC, NBC Sports Network, MSNBC, CNBC, Bravo, Telemundo, NBCOlympics.com, the NBC Olympics Live Extra mobile and tablet app, two specialty channels, and the first-ever 3D channel.

The decision to live stream every athletic competition — more than 3,500 hours, including all 32 sports and all 302 medals — on NBCOlympics.com and, for the first time, on the NBC Olympics Live Extra app for both mobile devices and tablets, significantly contributed to NBCU’s ability to reach $1.2 billion.

See the Bloomberg story here