Amazon has secured the rights to broadcast ATP tennis matches in the UK, having successfully outbid Sky for the male tour.
The deal will give the online giant the rights to broadcast matches from ATP 1000 and ATP 500 events, including the end-of-year ATP World Tour finals, starting from 2018.
Sky is currently in the final year of its five-year contract with the ATP - worth around £8m a year - but refused to offer an increase on the current terms, allowing Amazon to nab the rights with an offer of £10m a year.
The satellite broadcaster recently revamped its portfolio of channels with dedicated stations for football, cricket and golf, but tellingly opted to not launch a specialist tennis channel. Last year Sky also dropped its coverage of the US Open after 25 years.
Sky is preparing for a new round of bidding for the rights to the Premier League, which currently costs the broadcaster around £1.2 billion a year, forcing it to be more selective over its other rights packages.
Amazon's Prime Video service currently costs £7.99 a month, or £79 a year, in the UK.
Neil Wilkes
