{"id":188460,"date":"2026-03-03T14:23:42","date_gmt":"2026-03-03T14:23:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/188460\/"},"modified":"2026-03-03T14:23:42","modified_gmt":"2026-03-03T14:23:42","slug":"houston-dash-re-launch-sale-process-after-talks-with-rhc-group-end","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/188460\/","title":{"rendered":"Houston Dash Re-Launch Sale Process After Talks With RHC Group End"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n\tThe owners of the Houston Dash<\/a> are relaunching the formal process to sell the team after trying last year to finalize an agreement with a group<\/a> tied to a disappeared Chinese billionaire.<\/p>\n

\n\tTed Segal, who owns both the Dash and the Houston Dynamo<\/a>, was in advanced talks last year to sell the NWSL<\/a> club to RHC Partners for about $120 million, Sportico previously reported<\/a>. Those talks ended amid pushback from the league\u2019s central office about whether RHC and the provenance of its money would ultimately pass the NWSL\u2019s approval process, according to multiple sources with knowledge of the matter.<\/p>\n

\n\tThe Dash sale process, centered for months on the RHC talks, is now focusing elsewhere, said two of the sources, who were granted anonymity because the details are private. Representatives for the NWSL and RHC declined to comment. A rep for the team didn\u2019t immediately respond to an email seeking comment. <\/p>\n

\n\tThough RHC may have been willing to pay more than others interested in the team last year, the re-launched Dash sale has the benefit of another data point in the commercial growth of the league. In November, Atlanta Falcons and Atlanta United owner Arthur Blank agreed to pay a $165 million<\/a> expansion fee for an NWSL team in that city. The league is also currently in a rolling process of evaluating new expansion options, likely at fees even higher than Blank\u2019s. \u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tThe Dash, however, are not currently among the league\u2019s most valuable clubs. The team was worth $74 million when Sportico last published its valuations<\/a> in September 2024, which ranked 10th among the league\u2019s 14 franchises. The club plays its home games in Shell Energy Stadium, also home to the Dynamo.<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\"\"<\/p>\n

\n\tRHC was founded by Richard Hsiao, who is the American-born son of Chinese billionaire Xiao Jianhua. Xiao reportedly built his fortune\u00a0in business<\/a>\u00a0with Communist Party leaders and is currently in prison following a high-profile abduction<\/a> by Chinese agents and subsequent disappearance.<\/p>\n

\n\tThough Xiao\u2019s family office has grown its Western holdings during his time in jail, RHC was funded via money from the independent wealth of Hsiao\u2019s mother, Zhou Hongwen, Sportico reported last year. Hsiao is also the founder of J17 Capital, a venture fund that similarly traces its funding to Zhou\u2019s family, according to\u00a0Bloomberg<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\n\tSeparating NWSL clubs from their joint MLS<\/a> ownership also carries some challenges. That process has been underway in Portland for the last few years, after the Bhathal family bought the Thorns<\/a> from Merritt Paulson, who owns the Portland Timbers. The Dash likely share a significant amount of staffing and infrastructure with the Dynamo, and new owners will need to replace that themselves.<\/p>\n

\n\tSegal bought the Dash and the Dynamo in May 2021 for about $400 million, though the women\u2019s team was a near-zero part of the financials. Since then, however, league valuations and commercial opportunities have grown dramatically.<\/p>\n

\n\tThe average team was worth $105 million in those 2024 Sportico numbers, and is certainly worth significantly more now. There\u2019s also been a lot of ownership turnover. Though he bought the team just five years ago, Segal is now one of the longest-tenured control owners in the league.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The owners of the Houston Dash are relaunching the formal process to sell the team after trying last…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":188461,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[56,6472,23504,58,57,136,40400,75079],"class_list":{"0":"post-188460","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-houston","8":"tag-houston","9":"tag-houston-dash","10":"tag-houston-dynamo","11":"tag-houston-headlines","12":"tag-houston-news","13":"tag-mls","14":"tag-nwsl","15":"tag-rhc-group"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/188460","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=188460"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/188460\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/188461"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=188460"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=188460"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=188460"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}