Ordinary Gweilo

In the SCMP on Sunday, Tim Noonan wrote about the upcoming bidding process for the Hong Kong TV rights for the English Premier League (Subscription required):

The bidding for the right to broadcast the EPL in Hong Kong from 2007 to 2010 will begin next month. Much has been made about these rights that were purchased by Hong Kong Cable in 2004 for the staggering sum of HK$800 million.

He is sure that the rights will cost more this time around:

Whoever comes away with the rights, will probably have to pony up a minimum of US$1 billion and how that makes sense on the ledger sheets is beyond me.

“We will bid for the rights, however unprofitable it may be for us,” Hong Kong Cable chairman Stephen Ng Tin-hoi said a few months ago.

Does he mean US$1bn or HK$1bn?  The former would be ten times as much as Cable TV paid last time, the latter a more reasonable 25% increase. 

Certainly there should be more competition, with Now Broadband TV and TVB Pay Vision likely to join ESPN/Star Sports in challenging Cable TV for the rights.  What’s unclear (to me, at least) is whether Now plan to bid separately or whether they are working with ESPN.  Or could ESPN return to the Cable TV lineup (yet again) if they won the rights?