How much is a London 2012 viewer worth?

It depends, naturally enough, on where you live.

What is remarkable, though, is the sheer extent of the discrepancy between, say, Ms Middle America in Peoria and Mr West African taxi-driver or Bangladeshi farmer.

The International Olympic Committee (IOC) will need to narrow the gap if it is to keep its lucrative broadcasting revenues surging ahead at anything like the rate achieved in the four years, culminating with this summer's London 2012 Olympics and Paralympics.

Consider these figures:

The London Games, we now know, have yielded a mammoth $2.635 billion (£1.682 billion /€2.105 billion) in broadcasting revenue for the Movement.

Getting on for half of this – $1.2 billion (£766 million/€958 million) – has come from the United States.

This is partly, though, a function of the US' status as the planet's third most populous nation.


If you break down the 20-plus London 2012-related broadcasting deals, insofar as is possible, by head of population, some very interesting details emerge.

One of these is that there is a country where the right to broadcast the London exploits of Usain Bolt, Victoria Pendleton (pictured below) & Co is worth more per head of population than in the US.

That country is sports-crazy Australia.

By my calculations – and it is worth bearing in mind with all these numbers that variables such as effective exchange rates, precise population levels and the apportionment of fees between the Vancouver 2010 Winter Olympics and London 2012 will always leave some room for debate – the price of the right to broadcast the Summer Games in Australia works out at just over US$4 (£2.55/€3.19) per head of population.

This compares with $3.87 (£2.47/€3.09) for the United States.

Working down the next few places in the TV "medals table" for London 2012, we find Japan ($2.45 [£1.56/€1.95]), New Zealand ($2.05 [£1.30/€1.63]), Hong Kong ($1.85 [£1.18/€1.47]) and Canada ($1.85 [£1.18/€1.47]).


Western Europe begins to feature only in seventh spot, which is occupied by Italy, where rights have been sold for around $1.67 (£1.06/€1.33) per head of population.

This figure is sharply higher than that for the rest of the continent, including host nation the United Kingdom, which is covered by a 51-country deal between the IOC and the European Broadcasting Union (EBU).

The broad scope of the deal – which I understand includes parts of North Africa – makes the overall figure more tentative than most of the others.

Plus, I presume that different countries will contribute differing amounts, not necessarily commensurate with the size of their respective populations, to the $600 million (£383 million/€479 million) paid by the EBU.

But I would put the fee per head perhaps as low as 60 cents (38 GB pence/48 € cents) and definitely no more than $1 (63 GB pence/79 € cents).

It is, though, the difference between the rich, developed countries at the top of the pile and fees paid by the developing world that I find most thought provoking.

Take, for example, the deals covering 22 Asian countries – including highly-populous nations such as India, Indonesia, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Thailand and Vietnam.

By my reckoning, the value of these works out at about half a US cent per head of population; that is just over a tenth of one percent of the effective price tag to reach each potential Australian viewer.


If anything underlines the importance to the Olympic Movement of increasing its purchase in the cricket-mad Indian sub-continent (fans watching cricket on TV, pictured below), it is that statistic.

Per capita figures are similarly tiny in sub-Saharan Africa, where a recent deal covering Nigeria - the African country with the biggest population - works out by my reckoning at around a third of one US cent a head.

And then there are the likes of Brazil, Mexico, China, South Korea, South Africa – fast-developing countries with relatively large (in some cases very large) populations, increasing prosperity and global influence – and an avid interest in the Olympic Games.

The fees paid for broadcasting rights to these territories have started to increase significantly and will continue to rise.

But they would have to grow by several more orders of magnitude to catch up with Australia and the US, or even Italy.

South Korea – a past Summer Games and future Winter Games host – is probably close to the sort of level you might expect at around 60 cents (38 GB pence/48 € cents) per potential viewer.

So, arguably, is South Africa at 25-30 cents (15-20 GB pence/20-25 € cents).

But 2016 Olympic host Brazil (23 cents [14 GB pence/18 € cents]), 1968 host Mexico (18 cents [11 GB pence/14 € cents]), with the rest of Latin America at below 10 cents (6 GB pence/7 € cents), and above all 2008 host China (six cents [3 GB pence/4 € cents]) seem to me to exhibit plenty of scope for further growth.

In fairness, Brazilian rights for 2014-2016 have already been sold for a sum I estimate will push up the per capita amount for 2016 to at least 60 US cents (38 GB pence/48 € cents).


It will be interesting to see if that level can be maintained in 2020, when the country will not be the Olympic host.

The IOC, meanwhile, is far from the only sports rights holder whose finances would receive a big lift should they succeed in extracting more value from their Chinese properties.

But if you consider that hiking Chinese per capita rights fees to South Korean levels would raise more than $700 million (£446 million/€559 million), it gives you some idea of how significant the lift to the Olympic Movement might be.

That is not realistically going to happen any time soon.

But with US broadcaster NBC paying $2 billion (£1.3 billion/€1.6 million) for US rights to the 2014 and 2016 Games, compared with $2.2 billion (£1.4 billion/€1.7 billion) for 2010 and 2012, progress will need to be made in other markets if the IOC is to keep vital broadcast revenues steaming ahead.

The vast discrepancies in per capita fees paid from market to market, together with technological advances that should help rights-holders to generate more of their own revenue from their Olympic rights, suggest this may be achievable, although growth is most unlikely to match the 52 percent jump in broadcast income racked up in the quadrennium now drawing to a close.

But the relatively small sums raised from the vast majority of countries suggest that Olympic broadcasters across many zones – particularly in countries with competitive TV marketplaces – may have to resign themselves to stumping up more if they are to retain their status once the cauldron is extinguished in London.

David Owen worked for 20 years for the Financial Times in the United States, Canada, France and the UK. He ended his FT career as sports editor after the 2006 World Cup and is now freelancing, including covering the 2008 Beijing Olympics and 2010 World Cup. Owen's Twitter feed can be accessed here