Serie A is back at the table with private equity, and this time the numbers are serious. Carlyle, Bain, Oaktree and Italian firm Nextalia are all preparing binding bids for a minority stake in a new company that would hold the league's international media rights, betting business, and sponsorship operations abroad. Offers are due by September 4.
Investors are expected to pitch for somewhere between 10% and 20% of the venture. The unit generates around €200 million in core earnings annually and is being valued at €3 billion to €4 billion — figures that put it in the same conversation as similar deals done in Spain and France, where private equity has already taken minority stakes in domestic media rights businesses.
A deal Serie A badly needs to get right
The Italian league's international media revenues tell a sobering story. The Serie A international unit pulls in roughly €250 million a year. That's a fraction of what the Premier League and LaLiga generate abroad — a gap that has widened as broadcasters increasingly prioritise the expanded Champions League calendar and England's domestic product over Italian football.
JP Morgan has been working the phones on this since at least April, sounding out funds on Serie A's behalf. Notably, Oaktree — which owns reigning champions Inter Milan — is among those expected to bid. Make of that what you will in terms of conflict of interest conversations that will inevitably follow.
There's also a cautionary tale built into the league's recent history. Serie A tried a version of this in 2021, targeting a 10% stake sale in its domestic media unit at a €1.7 billion valuation to a CVC-led consortium. It collapsed. The 20 clubs couldn't reach the required majority to approve it.
The club vote is the real obstacle
Any deal still needs 14 of the 20 clubs to sign off. That's the number that sank the last attempt, and it remains the number that could sink this one too. Getting AC Milan, Inter, Juventus and enough of the other 17 clubs aligned on valuation, structure and terms is not a formality — it's the actual challenge.
If the votes hold and a deal closes, the league's odds of closing its international revenue gap improve measurably. If the clubs fracture again, Serie A risks burning another cycle of investor interest in a market where attention is already drifting north and west.
Binding bids land on September 4. Then comes the hard part.
