Prime Video on March 30 officially rings the bell for Amazon’s first pay-per-view boxing event as it looks to integrate the fight game into its growing live sports distribution portfolio.
The Tim Tszyu-Sebastian Fundora PPV fight card, which retails at $69.95, is the first of as many as 12 boxing events the streaming service hopes to distribute in 2024 as part of its recently signed multi-year deal with boxing promotion company Premier Boxing Champions, according to Prime Video director, head of partnerships Charlie Neiman. The streaming service has already announced it will distribute the May 4 Canelo Alvarez-Jaime Munguia PPV fight.
Neiman recently spoke to Multichannel News about the Tszyu-Fundora bout, as well as his expectations for boxing content on Prime Video. Here’s an edited version of that discussion.
MCN: How does the addition of pro boxing enhance Prime Video’s portfolio of live sports content?
Charlie Neiman: Prime Video is an entertainment destination, and what we do is we bring premium content to customers year-round. Championship boxing is broadly appealing and the big fights are high-stakes events, so we really looked at the space and said that boxing is a great fit as it relates to our portfolio of live sports properties on Prime Video. So offering a year-round slate of really big boxing fights alongside things like exclusive Thursday Night Football games and a NASCAR package that we recently announced that runs in the summer really provides a nice component to what fans can expect from the service.
MCN: What does Prime Video bring to the sport of boxing and to its boxing partner, Premier Boxing Champions?
CN: What I’m most excited about is the distribution we’re going to bring to the partnership. We have 200 million plus Prime members around the world. That number is even larger when you think about customers who access our service. So the sport of boxing is going to have a partner that is going to bring more awareness, and it’s going to drive a new generation of fans. Premier Boxing Champions obviously carries a really strong stable of fighters. They’ve been great partners and we’re excited to innovate the sport together.
MCN: What are your expectations for Saturday’s event, and how big was the loss of Keith Thurman to Saturday’s main event fight?
CN: I think we’re bringing a high volume of quality fights to our first card, which is great out of the gate. We’re learning about the boxing industry in real time as it relates to injuries, and understand that these things happen. Luckily, PBC has a great stable of fighters, so they were able to plug in a replacement who, frankly, is a really compelling fighter — a lot of folks have been wanting to see [Tszyu and Fundora] fight each other. So we don’t view it as a major change outside of a little bit of tweaking that had to happen on the back end, but we’re still really excited about the card.
MCN: Do you have any technological concerns revolving around the distribution of your first pay-per-view boxing event?
CN: We’re confident it's going to be a great experience. Obviously, we are throwing in a lot of resources from our product, technical, and operational teams to make sure that it’s a flawless experience for customers. Luckily, Amazon has a lot of experience not only in the live sports arena when you think about Thursday Night Football and other marquee major properties we've streamed, but also in the transactional space. Our customers are very used to buying and renting movies and TV shows, as well as adding channels to their Prime Video experience. We think pay-per-view is just a natural extension of that experience.
MCN: How many boxing events do you expect to distribute this year?
CN: During our multiyear deal, we’re targeting somewhere between 10 to 12 fights a year, the majority of which I think will be pay-per-view, including some really major bouts, the May 4 [Canelo Alvarez-Jaime Munguia] fight being a good example. Alongside that we’ll have PBC fights that will be available without pay-per-view and free to prime members. With those fights, we’ll have an opportunity to showcase up-and-coming fighters and to tell their stories as we potentially watch them develop into future pay-per-view stars.
