Atairos, NBCUniversal order $293M stake in Opry Enjoyment Team

A 2021 performance at the Gand Ole Opry.
A 2021 performance at the Grand Ole Opry. Picture: Terry Wyatt/Getty Images

Pursuing a ten years of financial investment in songs venues and region audio content material, Ryman Hospitality declared a partnership with NBCUniversal this week.

  • As part of the offer, financial commitment agency Atairos and its husband or wife NBCUniversal procured a 30% stake in Opry Amusement Team, the amusement arm of Ryman Hospitality. The original equity expense was $293 million.
  • Ryman chairman and CEO Colin Reed tells Axios “the alternatives are countless” thanks to the growth of the company’s entertainment division.

Why it matters: The partnership with NBCUniversal positions Ryman to draw in much more international tourists to Nashville even though offering a world wide system to establishing country tunes artists.

What he’s indicating: “We are a relatively little octopus, but NBCUniversal is a large octopus with all these tentacles,” Reed suggests.

  • “For instance, a person of the belongings that falls beneath the entire ownership of NBCUniversal is Sky, which is the major satellite carrier in northern Europe. So they have a system that, if we can figure out how to acquire our material and set it on that system, we can connect to tens of hundreds of thousands of extra international consumers.”

Be good: Ryman invested in upgrades and renovations to its stable of Nashville venues — the Ryman Auditorium, the Grand Ole Opry and the Wildhorse Saloon — in the previous ten years. It’s also shut to finalizing the acquire of the Austin lodge and enjoyment intricate Block 21.

  • Commencing in 2018, the corporation extra a slate of place music venues in partnership with singer-songwriter Blake Shelton known as Ole Pink.
  • Ryman also invested greatly in authentic content by helping develop the ABC demonstrate “Nashville” and partnering to start the media platform Circle.

Between the lines: The offer with NBCUniversal and Atairos came together after several corporations expressed an interest in Opry Leisure Team.

  • “When we fulfilled with [the potential investment groups], we told them, ‘We’re not here talking about funds. We are right here speaking about how you, the trader coming in, can assist increase our business enterprise, but also how you can help preserve the remarkable integrity of this business and what it stands for, and how critical it is to the metropolis of Nashville,’ ” Reed says.

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