IMG Worldwide, the sports management and marketing colossus, is for sale and could fetch $2 billion, according to the Wall Street Journal.
Forstmann Little, which reportedly paid $750 million for IMG in 2004, expects to begin reviewing offers later this month, and it’ll likely get several of them, for Carlyle Group, Bain Capital, KKR, William Morris Endeavor Entertainment and Creative Artists Agency are said to be weighing bids.
“We’re a market leader in almost every business we’re in,” George Pyne, the president of IMG Sports, noted earlier this year.
Since a $2 billion price tag excludes many prospective buyers, Forstmann Little could choose to sell the company division by division, an approach that could conceivably net even more. Alternately, IMG’s new owner could spin off a few high-profile divisions once the transaction is completed.
If IMG’s golf division become available, it would entice many suitors, as it has its fingers in many pies. It manages the careers of a parade of professional golfers, among them Ernie Els, Luke Donald, Colin Montgomerie, Annika Sorenstam and Michelle Wie. In one way or another, it’s involved with 37 international professional events, including 15 on the PGA and LPGA tours and the Australian Masters, the Ricoh Women’s British Open and the Abu Dhabi HSBC Golf Championship. In addition, IMG Golf owns and manages golf properties, and its design wing has produced dozens of tracks in countries too numerous to list.
Whoever ends up owning it will have a nice slice of the golf business.