CVC Consolidates Portfolio with SportsCo Restructure

CVC Capital Partners has announced plans to refinance its extensive £9 billion portfolio of sports investments, marking one of the most ambitious financial restructurings ever undertaken in the global sports industry. This initiative aims to consolidate CVC's sports-related assets, which include stakes in rugby, football, tennis and volleyball, under a new holding company called “SportsCo”. The creation of SportsCo will provide a platform to unlock long-term capital and prepare for a potential initial public offering (IPO) or strategic equity sale.

The newly formed SportsCo will serve as the central structure for CVC’s investments across premier sports properties, including the Six Nations, Premiership Rugby, La Liga, the Women’s Tennis Association (WTA), and Volleyball World. According to sources familiar with the process, this restructuring will enable CVC to raise over £2 billion in debt secured against the collective value of its sports assets. This debt will be asset-backed and is expected to attract interest from long-term institutional investors, such as pension funds and insurance companies, who seek steady returns.

To manage the refinancing, CVC has enlisted the services of renowned financial advisers, including Goldman Sachs, PJT Partners and Raine Group. This trio will oversee the debt issuance strategy and guide long-term structuring options, including the potential for taking SportsCo public by 2028.

CVC's ambition with this model has two main goals: first, to create a scalable platform that can manage shared services—such as data analytics, sponsorship technology and broadcast innovations, across multiple sports properties; and second, to generate a more compelling and stable investment proposition by packaging various rights into a unified, cash-flow-generating structure.

Notably, while the assets will be grouped for financial purposes, each league or rights holder is expected to maintain operational autonomy. This ensures that investments remain tailored to the specific needs of each sport while still benefiting from CVC's broader commercial expertise.

This move comes as private equity continues to transform the sports industry. With growing institutional interest in predictable, media rights-driven revenue, CVC's approach could set a precedent for future deals in the sector. Other major players, such as Ares, Silver Lake and RedBird, are closely monitoring this strategy, particularly as interest grows in treating sports as an “infrastructure” asset class, one that is stable, scalable and monetisable.