Sports Illustrated Ownership Says Site Will Still Publish Articles

For a few weeks now, the status and future of Sports Illustrated has been murky at best. However, new regulatory filings appear to indicate that the brand will continue to publish articles.

In January, it was revealed that Arena Group missed a licensing payment to Authentic Brands Group, a licensing entity that owns the rights to the Sports Illustrated name and branding. This led to Arena Group laying off 100 employees and made it look like the end was near for one of the most celebrated publications in sports media.

However, just days after this news broke, Authentic released a statement saying it intends for the SI brand to continue to "evolve and grow in a way that serves sports news readers, sports fans, and consumers."

Now, Sportico is reporting that Arena Group has stated in a recent SEC filing that it "expects to enter into a letter agreement with ABG," with "ABG" of course being Authentic Brands Group.

The filing came Friday, and Arena said that plans to continue running Sports Illustrated until. "ABG provides written notice of its desire to transfer the license to another party."

READ: LICENSING GROUP BEHIND SPORTS ILLUSTRATED SAYS BRAND WILL CONTINUE DESPITE REPORTS OF MASS LAYOFFS

Arena also said it expects ABG to drop the $45 million penalty it levied after Arena missed a quarterly payment in 2023.

Sportico reported that more public disclosures are expected in the near future.

It's interesting that ABG would be cool with letting Arena continue operating using the SI name and branding, but it makes some sense. Letting the brand go dormant temporarily is worse for it than letting it limp around until ABG finds a new group to license the name to.

Surely, we'll learn more about how this will all work soon, but this has been a tough run for the storied sports outlet.

Just months before the licensing issue came to light, Sports Illustrated was accused of using artificial intelligence to generate articles.