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CVC’s Global Sport Group Saddles Up: Why Equine Might Be Their Smartest Bet Yet
Today’s note looks at a deal that feels small in dollar terms but big in signal value. CVC’s Global Sport Group (GSG) moving into U.S. equestrian via a $300 million majority stake in Equine Network. It’s GSG’s first new league-style investment since the platform launched and it tells you a lot about where CVC thinks the next wave of sports value will come from.
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Deal Snapshot: What CVC Is Buying
GSG is close to acquiring a majority stake in Equine Network at a valuation of around $300 million. Equine Network is a profitable, fast‑growing U.S. equestrian platform that combines owned events, sanctioned competitions, and media/services into one ecosystem.
Key facts:
Majority stake for $300 million, first fresh GSG league investment since the group was formed in late 2025.
Equine Network runs about 40 owned and operated competitions and sanctions more than 800 third‑party events across the U.S.
Disciplines range from team roping and rodeo to high‑end showjumping.
The business is already profitable and described as “fast growing”.
Prize pools for some events reach into the tens of millions of dollars annually when you add up series and finales.
CEO Tom Winsor has spent three decades building the platform through publishing, digital, and events, and has executed a steady roll‑up of equine media and event assets (including The Horse and Nilforushan Equisport Events). In other words, CVC is not buying a concept; it is buying a scaled, cash‑generative niche platform with a clear M&A history.
Why Equestrian? Understanding the Market and the Money
On first glance, equine looks niche compared with LaLiga, Six Nations or WTA. But underneath, it’s a big, fragmented, high‑spend ecosystem that looks tailor‑made for a consolidation and tech‑enablement play.
Some numbers:
U.S. Horse & Other Equine Production is roughly a $2.5 billion market in 2026, growing at about 4.8% annually over the last five years.
The broader U.S. horse industry generates $122 billion in economic impact and supports more than 1.7 million jobs.
Around 6 million Americans participate in equestrian activities each year, and roughly 1.6 million households own horses.
US Equestrian licenses 2,300–2,500 competitions annually across disciplines, underlining how wide but fragmented the competitive landscape is.
Prize money economics are also more serious than most outside the sector realise:
World Series of Team Roping pays out more than $30 million a year, including a Las Vegas finale that alone has distributed over $11 million.
The National Finals Rodeo will pay out around $13.5 million in 2025, and major rodeos like Houston are pushing $2.5 million in total athlete winnings.
On the Olympic side, new US Equestrian “Open Series” initiatives now offer over $1 million prize money per discipline (dressage, eventing, jumping).
Crucially for an investor: a significant share of event revenue flows back as prize money, making the competition circuit central to the livelihoods and careers of riders. That creates a sticky ecosystem: riders have to show up, points and rankings matter, and organisers that can guarantee prize pools and calendar continuity become systemically important.
Strategic Fit: What Equine Network Adds to GSG
GSG was built as a $14 billion multi‑league platform with stakes across LaLiga, Ligue 1, Six Nations, United Rugby Championship, Premiership Rugby, WTA and Volleyball World, among others. Adding Equine Network does three important things for that portfolio.
1. Gives GSG a U.S. Operating Beachhead
Most of CVC’s league‑level investments sit in Europe. Equine Network gives GSG an immediately scaled U.S. presence with:
National reach through 40 owned events and 800+ sanctioned competitions.
Deep relationships with venues, officials, and regulators via US equestrian bodies.
A platform to learn the U.S. event, participation, and sponsorship market from the inside.
If GSG wants to build a North American footprint across other properties (volleyball, alternative formats, youth sports), having an on‑the‑ground platform with real operations and data is a valuable staging point.
2. Diversifies Sport and Revenue Mix
Most existing GSG assets are classic media‑driven leagues where 40–60% of revenue comes from media rights, then sponsorship, tickets, and central commercial rights. Equine Network sits in a different quadrant:
Participant‑pay instead of spectator‑led. Entry fees, horse registrations, stabling and associated services are core revenues.
Prize money flows back to riders, creating a circulation of cash within the ecosystem rather than pure broadcast‑driven economics.
Sponsorship is a mix of endemic brands and wealthy patrons, with plenty of room for professionalisation and non‑endemic partners.
That diversifies cash flow exposure away from pure media cycles while still leaving upside from under‑monetised media and sponsorship in equestrian.
3. Provides a Roll‑Up Platform in a Fragmented Niche
Equine Network already sanctions 800+ third‑party events and has a track record of acquiring complementary businesses. That’s exactly the starting position you want for a classic private equity roll‑up:
Fragmented field of independent shows and facilities, many sub‑scale and under‑capitalised.
Scope to bolt on events at lower “small company” EBITDA multiples and re‑rate them as part of a larger platform.
Opportunity to centralise back‑office functions, technology, and sponsorship sales to lift margins.
Equine Network can move from being a big player in equine to being the infrastructure layer for a whole class of U.S. equestrian competition sanctioning, tech stack, media and commercial.
The CVC Playbook: Tech, Data and Commercialisation
CVC’s thesis in sports is now well‑defined: centralise commercial rights, invest heavily in digital and data, and use scale to unlock premium media and sponsorship economics.
Learning from Formula One
In Formula One, CVC acquired control of the commercial rights in 2006 for around $2 billion, grew the business to an $8 billion enterprise, and extracted $4 billion in dividends and partial sales along the way. They:
Centralised media and race promotion rights.
Profoundly improved governance and team revenue sharing (team prize fund grew roughly 4x).
Expanded and globalised the calendar, boosting the value of the media product.
The lesson: consolidating fragmented commercial rights and professionalising the product can create huge value even in an already global sport.
LaLiga and the Digital Transformation Blueprint
In LaLiga, CVC invested €1.994 billion for an 8.2% stake via a 50‑year partnership, with strict rules that 70% of the capital had to go into infrastructure and digital transformation. The money has been used for:
Stadium connectivity, OTT platforms, and a centralised tech arm (LaLiga Tech/Sportian) now serving clubs and external clients.
Data‑driven sponsorship valuation and new revenue lines from digital products.
CVC partners have publicly said they are “very pleased” with the progress and are targeting LaLiga valuations in the €33–35 billion range over 7–10 years from an initial €24 billion base.
Applying the Playbook to Equine
Equestrian is years behind football or F1 in digital maturity, which is exactly why it’s interesting to private capital. The likely GSG playbook for Equine Network:
Unified Tech Stack: Build or buy a single registration, scheduling, results, and scoring platform for all sanctioned events.
Livestreaming and OTT: Upgrade production for flagship events and package content for OTT distribution and social either through partnerships (e.g., ClipMyHorse‑style platforms) or owned channels.
Data and Analytics: Create digital “passports” for horses and riders, track performance across circuits, and provide analytics services to riders, teams, and sponsors.
Commercial Engine: Centralise sponsorship sales across 800+ events, price inventory using data‑led media valuation, and open the door to non‑endemic brands that want to reach a high‑income, predominantly female audience.
Global sports tech and analytics markets are forecast to grow at 7–8%+ CAGR over the next decade, and sports analytics platforms themselves at around 6% annually. Equestrian barely features in those segments today, which leaves a lot of white space.
The Capital Side: €2.7 Billion Debt Raise and Platform Building
Running alongside the Equine Network deal, GSG is in the market for around €2.7 billion of new debt to refinance existing facilities and fund further acquisitions.
Key points:
Size: €2.7–2.75 billion, with tranches reportedly at 5, 10 and 25‑year maturities.
Rating: Structured to achieve investment‑grade status—rare for a PE‑backed sports vehicle.
Use of proceeds: Refinancing expensive legacy debt and creating dry powder for new deals in “high‑growth sports” like tennis, rugby, football, volleyball—and now equestrian.
Equity talks: Ongoing discussions with the likes of Ares and Bain to bring in long‑term institutional capital alongside CVC.
Why this matters from an investing perspective:
Investment‑grade debt lowers the cost of capital versus typical high‑yield sports financing, widening the spread between portfolio growth and financing cost.
Long‑dated maturities (up to 25 years) match the reality that media cycles and league transformations take time; this isn’t a quick‑flip fund.
Co‑investment from other institutional investors helps de‑risk CVC’s concentrated exposure while validating the GSG valuation and model.
The structure makes GSG look less like a classic 5–7 year PE fund and more like a permanent capital vehicle or listed infrastructure‑style platform, in line with where big alternatives managers want to take sports as an asset class.
Return Profile: Small Ticket, Big Optionality
GSG’s portfolio is valued at around $14 billion; Equine Network at $300 million for the majority stake implies maybe 3% of platform value. From a portfolio construction lens, this is a small ticket with asymmetric upside.
Stylised return logic:
Assume Equine Network today runs at 25% EBITDA margins on a mid‑nine‑figure revenue base and is bought at 8x EBITDA, which fits typical private terms for niche sports properties.
With organic growth (event expansion, modest pricing), tech‑driven margin lift, and incremental M&A, you can plausibly model 8–12% revenue CAGR and margin expansion to 30%+.
If GSG can then re‑rate the asset to a “sports platform” multiple (12–15x EBITDA) in 10 years, you end up with a 14–20%+ IRR range before any portfolio‑level synergies.
Because the cheque is small relative to the platform, the downside is contained. If equestrian never really unlocks media or sponsorship upside and just ticks along as a solid participant‑pay business, it still contributes durable cash flows. If it works, it becomes a proof‑of‑concept for applying the GSG model to other under‑commercialised, fragmented sports verticals.
Key Risks – and Why CVC Still Likes It
The bet isn’t risk‑free. Issues to watch:
Niche Appeal: Equestrian won’t suddenly look like the NFL; audience size and broadcast demand are inherently smaller.
High Barriers to Participation: Horse ownership and competition costs are structurally high, which caps mass‑market participation growth.
Fragmented Governance: Multiple sanctioning bodies and traditions can make standardisation politically hard.
Execution Risk on Tech/M&A: Rolling out a common tech stack and integrating dozens of acquisitions is non‑trivial.
But the reasons CVC likes it anyway are the same reasons sophisticated capital is moving into sports generally:
Existing profitability and cash generation at entry reduce reliance on blue‑sky projections.
Fragmentation and under‑investment in tech and commercial operations mean there is genuine low‑hanging fruit.
The demographic is wealthy and engaged, which is attractive for sponsors and direct‑to‑consumer plays even at modest scale.
As part of a diversified $14 billion platform with long‑dated, investment‑grade financing, GSG can afford to be patient in building the category.
Big Picture: What This Tells Us About Sports as an Asset Class
Stepping back, this move is another data point in the institutionalisation of sports:
Private equity and alternative managers executed more than 400 sports transactions in 2024, with platform deals almost doubling year‑on‑year.
Leagues across the U.S. and Europe have opened their doors to institutional capital via minority‑stake regimes, creating more inventory for platforms like GSG.
Media rights are still projected to grow to $78 billion globally by 2030, even with all the noise around streaming economics and cord‑cutting.
CVC’s approach is to industrialise this, taking sports from one‑off “trophy asset” deals into a diversified, professionally managed asset platform with shared tech, commercial and capital markets infrastructure.
Equine Network is not the largest piece of that puzzle. But it is a very clear expression of the thesis:
Find a big, messy, under‑served sports vertical.
Buy the leading operating platform at a reasonable multiple.
Layer on tech, data, and commercial sophistication.
Use cheap, long‑dated capital to compound over a decade, not a cycle.
If CVC can turn equestrian into a more modern, data‑rich, commercially coherent product without losing its authenticity, this will look like a very smart $300 million spent in five to ten years’ time.
