{"id":118670,"date":"2023-04-03T08:06:43","date_gmt":"2023-04-03T12:06:43","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/?p=118670"},"modified":"2023-04-03T08:15:53","modified_gmt":"2023-04-03T12:15:53","slug":"endeavor-wwe-fc","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/2023\/04\/03\/endeavor-wwe-fc\/","title":{"rendered":"Breaking: Endeavor Announces Purchase of WWE &#038; Merger with UFC"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>UFC Parent Company Endravor have today announced the purchase of WWE. They will now merge the UFC and WWE into one publicly traded company valued at over $21 billion. The two brands will still act separately, making the arrangement similar to that of Stardom and NJPW who operate individually under the Bushiroad Fight banner.<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Brock Lesnar takes Omos to Suplex City: WrestleMania 39 Sunday Highlights\" width=\"640\" height=\"360\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/bBEKwJVsjrQ?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>Here is<a href=\"https:\/\/investor.endeavorco.com\/news\/news-details\/2023\/Endeavor-Announces-UFC-and-WWE-to-Form-a-21-Billion-Global-Live-Sports-and-Entertainment-Company\/default.aspx\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"> Endravor&#8217;s release<\/a> announcing the news:<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Endeavor Group Holdings, Inc. (NYSE: EDR) (\u201cEndeavor\u201d) and World Wrestling Entertainment, Inc. (NYSE: WWE) (\u201cWWE\u201d) today announced that they have signed a definitive agreement to form a new, publicly listed company consisting of two iconic, complementary, global sports and entertainment brands: UFC and WWE. Upon close, Endeavor will hold a 51% controlling interest in the new company and existing WWE shareholders will hold a 49% interest in the new company.<\/p>\n<p>Together, UFC and WWE will have global reach, impressive scale and omnichannel distribution. On a combined 2022 fiscal year-end basis, UFC and WWE achieved revenue of $2.4 billion and a 10% annual revenue growth rate since 2019.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThis is a rare opportunity to create a global live sports and entertainment pureplay built for where the industry is headed,\u201d said Ariel Emanuel, CEO of Endeavor. \u201cFor decades, Vince and his team have demonstrated an incredible track record of innovation and shareholder value creation, and we are confident that Endeavor can deliver significant additional value for shareholders by bringing UFC and WWE together.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cGiven the incredible work that Ari and Endeavor have done to grow the UFC brand \u2013 nearly doubling its revenue over the past seven years \u2013 and the immense success we\u2019ve already had in partnering with their team on a number of ventures, I believe that this is without a doubt the best outcome for our shareholders and other stakeholders,\u201d said Vincent K. McMahon, Executive Chairman of WWE.<\/p>\n<p>https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=f0t7p9l3ACk<\/p>\n<p>McMahon continued, \u201cTogether, we will be a $21+ billion live sports and entertainment powerhouse with a collective fanbase of more than a billion people and an exciting growth opportunity. The new company will be well positioned to maximize the value of our combined media rights, enhance sponsorship monetization, develop new forms of content and pursue other strategic mergers and acquisitions to further bolster our strong stable of brands. I, along with the current WWE management team, look forward to working closely with Ari and the Endeavor and UFC teams to take the businesses to the next level.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The new company will be led by Emanuel (Chief Executive Officer), who will also continue in his role as Chief Executive Officer of Endeavor, McMahon (Executive Chairman of the Board) and Mark Shapiro, who will be President and Chief Operating Officer of both Endeavor and the new company. Dana White will continue in his role as President of UFC and Nick Khan will serve as President of WWE. The Board of Directors will consist of 11 members who will be appointed at a later date, six of whom will be appointed by Endeavor and five of whom by WWE.<\/p>\n<p>Together, UFC and WWE expect to deliver an estimated $50 million to $100 million in annualized run rate cost synergies by leveraging, among other things, Endeavor\u2019s back office and robust infrastructure. Endeavor also expects significant growth across revenue areas including domestic and international media rights, ticket sales and yield optimization, event operations, sponsorship, licensing and premium hospitality. Endeavor\u2019s success at UFC, including increasing commercial opportunities that have driven more than 2x Adjusted EBITDA growth since its acquisition in late 2016, demonstrates the significant value creation opportunity and upside potential of having UFC and WWE under one roof.&#8221;<\/p>\n<div class=\"entry-content\">\n<p><em><span data-preserver-spaces=\"true\">Stay tuned to the\u00a0<\/span><\/em><a class=\"editor-rtfLink\" href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_self\"><em><span data-preserver-spaces=\"true\">Last Word on Pro Wrestling<\/span><\/em><\/a><em><span data-preserver-spaces=\"true\">\u00a0for more on this and other stories from around the world of wrestling, as they develop. You can always count on LWOPW to be on top of the major news in the wrestling world, as well as to provide you with analysis, previews, videos, interviews, and editorials on the wrestling world. You can check out an almost unlimited array of WWE content on the\u00a0<\/span><\/em><a class=\"editor-rtfLink\" href=\"https:\/\/watch.wwe.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"><em><span data-preserver-spaces=\"true\">WWE Network<\/span><\/em><\/a><em><span data-preserver-spaces=\"true\">\u00a0and\u00a0<\/span><\/em><a class=\"editor-rtfLink\" href=\"https:\/\/www.peacocktv.com\/watch\/home\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"><em><span data-preserver-spaces=\"true\">Peacock<\/span><\/em><\/a><em><span data-preserver-spaces=\"true\">.<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>UFC Parent Company Endravor have today announced the purchase of WWE. They will now merge the UFC and WWE into one publicly traded company valued at over $21 billion. The two brands will still act separately, making the arrangement similar to that of Stardom and NJPW who operate individually under the Bushiroad Fight banner. Here [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2013,"featured_media":74533,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[2,12,25,26,4,3],"tags":[752,8511],"class_list":["post-118670","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-featured","category-news","category-raw","category-smackdown","category-wwe","category-wwe-universe","tag-ufc","tag-wwe-sale"],"modified_by":"Alex Richards, LWOF Editor","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/118670","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2013"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=118670"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/118670\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/74533"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=118670"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=118670"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=118670"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}