International law firm Dorsey & Whitney LLP announced today that a team of its U.K. and U.S. based lawyers led by Partner Carsten Greve advised on the $1 billion joint venture between Perform Group, a global sports media company, and Matchroom Boxing, the leading boxing promoter in the U.K. with fighters like Anthony Joshua, Daniel Jacobs, Dilian Whyte, Amir Khan, Kell Brook, Tony Bellew and Katie Taylor in their stable. 

The joint venture establishes a new U.S. boxing promoter (Matchroom Boxing USA) which will stage 16 major boxing events in the United States each year for the next eight years from September 2018, all of which will be streamed on Perform’s sports streaming service DAZN in the U.S. DAZN, which is often described as a “Netflix for sports”, already operates successfully in Japan, Germany, Canada, Austria and Switzerland. 

A multi-disciplinary and multi-office Dorsey team led by London Corporate Partner Carsten Greve, London/Denver Corporate Partner Paul Thompson and London Commercial/IP Partner Ron Moscona represented Perform Group in negotiating and structuring the joint venture and with the key eight-year broadcast license agreement between DAZN and the joint venture. 

“We have worked extensively with the Dorsey team in London and across the U.S. and been extremely impressed with the quality of advice, seamless cooperation across jurisdictions and their tireless efforts. Given the U.K./U.S. elements to the Matchroom partnership, they were the perfect fit to help us deliver this ground-breaking deal on an extremely tight timetable. We look forward to continuing to work with Carsten and the Dorsey team as this venture transforms U.S. boxing.” said Ben Barlow, General Counsel of Perform Group.

“We are delighted to have been given the opportunity to work with the team at Perform Group on this ground-breaking billion dollar deal in the boxing industry. The DAZN platform represents the future of sports broadcasting and we are thrilled to be involved with its development and its launch in the U.S.  Working with Ben and the wider team at Perform Group is thoroughly enjoyable and we are looking forward to continuing to assist Matchroom Boxing USA over the next eight years and beyond.” said London Corporate Partner Carsten Greve.