The head of the men’s professional tennis tour has warned that the sport’s continued failure to pool commercial businesses and reduce fragmentation between events is leading to billions of dollars in lost revenue.
Andrea Gaudenzi, chair of the Association of Tennis Professionals, told the FT that bringing together the men’s and women’s tours, the International Tennis Federation and the four Grand Slams — Roland-Garros, Wimbledon plus the Australian and US Opens — would transform the finances of tennis and unlock a huge potential fan base. He estimates that the current revenue generated across professional tennis of about $3.5bn a year could double or even treble if the entities were to combine forces.
“Tennis is under-monetised. There is a huge opportunity to grow the pie,” he says. The sport needs to create a “one-stop shop” for broadcasters, sponsors, betting companies, fans and players that can “move, change, adapt, innovate and be ready for the challenges that we will all face in the next 10 years”, he adds.
“We’re still too fragmented, too slow, there’s too much internal fighting, too much focus on what share of the pie we should all get rather than growing the pie overall.”
Gaudenzi, who has been ATP chair since 2020, has long been a vocal advocate of proposals to bring the two tours, the ITF and the four Grand Slams under a single umbrella that could strike global deals for TV rights and sponsorship.
Outlines of a deal, backed by private equity group CVC Capital Partners, were initially agreed in 2021, but have since failed to come to fruition. Talks ran aground over a range of sticking points, including how future revenue would be shared and the valuations sought by the different entities involved.
The Grand Slams, for example, operate as non-profit organisations with proceeds redirected to the tennis governing bodies in their home countries. Of Wimbledon’s operating profit of £52.7mn last year, £48.1mn was distributed to the Lawn Tennis Association, the British governing body for tennis and padel.
Gaudenzi, a former professional player himself, concedes that the same stumbling blocks that have so far hampered an agreement remain, but he still hopes that a deal to unite tennis can be reached.
“In my second life after being a tennis player, I was an entrepreneur. As a tech entrepreneur you go for the moonshot and you try for something extremely difficult,” he says. “The opportunity is massive, and I still have a lot of energy to keep fighting and trying.”
When negotiations stalled, the Women’s Tennis Association instead agreed a $150mn investment deal with CVC in 2022 that created a corporate entity responsible for all of WTA’s commercial income.
$3.5bn
Estimated annual revenue generated across professional tennis
However, Gaudenzi remains cautious about involving outside capital in what he sees as necessary tennis-wide reforms. While private equity could provide cash to fund investment in growth, such as expanding tennis arenas, any capital injection should not be used to increase prize money, he says.
“Dilution has a cost. Once you do that, you’re giving up revenue and profit perpetually. I’m not a big advocate of that because the cash should be reinvested in growth.”
The ATP, he says, was generating sufficient revenue that it did not need outside investors to achieve its aims. For example, $260mn has been spent to upgrade facilities at the Cincinnati Open.
While merger talks dragged, the ATP embarked on its own “OneVision” reform programme designed to streamline its tournament calendar and focus attention, both among fans and elite players, on top-tier events.
Seven of the existing nine Masters 1000 tournaments — the highest level of tour event — have been expanded to 12 days, while the number of 250 tournaments, the lowest rung, is being reduced. Rules requiring players to compete in a minimum number of tournaments have also been loosened to reduce the risk of player burnout.
Players have increasingly voiced concerns that the congested competition calendar is becoming a serious problem, especially for those at the top.
Some of the ATP’s changes have been made with an eye on 2028, when a new Masters 1000 event in Saudi Arabia will join the calendar. While Riyadh has recently reined in spending on sport — funding for golf and boxing has been slashed — Gaudenzi expects that interest in tennis will hold up.
“They’re definitely focused on premium properties, and we’re one of them,” he says.
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The ATP, along with the WTA and the Grand Slams, has faced growing discontent from players about pay. Wimbledon and Roland-Garros both announced prize money increases this year, but below what players have been demanding.
As part of the OneVision reforms, the ATP introduced a profit-sharing scheme with players, and allowed access to the tour’s accounts for the first time to improve transparency. The ATP also points to the rise in total payouts to players this year to $267mn, up $100mn since 2019.
Pension contributions have more than doubled in that time to $28mn, while prize money this year for the ATP Challenger Tour, a circuit for younger and lower-ranked players, is projected to top $33mn, up more than 160 per cent since 2022.
Gaudenzi believes the dispute is not about hard numbers but about points of principle.
“It’s not about the dollar amount really, it’s about aligning interests. You want the players as partners,” he says. “At the moment, we have a little bit of an awkward relationship where players are independent contractors. Tournaments do their own thing, which is OK, but it’s not fully aligned. It could be a lot better.”
This article has been amended to clarify that ATP invested $260mn in the Cincinnati Open
