LIV Golf CEO Scott O\u2019Neil told Scott Wapner on CNBC\u2019s \u201cHalftime Report\u201d that the circuit is three years from profitability if he is able to secure new investment when Saudi Arabia\u2019s Public Investment Fund withdraws its funding at the end of this year.<\/p>\n
O\u2019Neil said on Tuesday he is meeting with potential investors in an attempt to secure a potential $350 million investment that would allow him to reimagine the league and continue past 2026.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe response has been positive. What\u2019s been really interesting, how do you slice this? How do you cut it? You know, is there one partner that comes in, maybe a big private equity firm, at the full $300 [million], or do you have 10 or 12 investors at $50 and $25 million units. And there seems to be an expression of interest on the family office side in the $50 million dollar range and the private equity firms are looking at a one take all,\u201d O\u2019Neil said.<\/p>\n
O\u2019Neil was asked specifically about Bryson DeChambeau\u2019s ongoing negotiations for a new deal with LIV Golf after this season, \u201cBryson was involved in the design of the business plan. And so, yes, he\u2019s engaged, he\u2019s committed,\u201d O\u2019Neil said. He was also asked about Jon Rahm\u2019s status with multiple years remaining on his current deal.<\/p>\n
\u201cI spoke to [Rahm] through text quite a few times. We were back and forth again this morning. This is different, and I know it\u2019s hard for others in the golf industry to understand, but this is a group that is committed to their teams. They\u2019re committed to the league, and they\u2019re committed to this program,\u201d O\u2019Neil said.<\/p>\n
LIV Golf played last week in Spain and its next event is scheduled to be played July 23-26 in England, leading Wapner to ask, \u201cCan you guarantee today that the four remaining tournaments on your schedule will actually take place?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat I can guarantee is a heck of a return if you come invest in this business,\u201d O\u2019Neil said.<\/p>\n
When asked what would happen if the PIF pulled its funding before the end of the year, O\u2019Neil added, \u201cYou have to take an incredible organization like PIF at their word.\u201d<\/p>\n
O\u2019Neil was asked how LIV Golf would look different if he\u2019s able to replace PIF\u2019s funding, which is projected to surpass $6 billion since the league launched in 2022.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe question is, will the business be different than it was over the last five years? I can say, dramatically. This will be a very disciplined approach,\u201d he said. \u201cWe\u2019re cutting the expense side dramatically, and the revenue momentum that we\u2019ve had, you know first year in \u201925 we doubled revenue, we\u2019re already up $100 million over last year in \u201826. We have really good business momentum.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis is about getting the costs under control, reimagining what the business could, should and will look like, and then engaging our players as partners, like true equity partners in this business.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"LIV Golf CEO Scott O\u2019Neil told Scott Wapner on CNBC\u2019s \u201cHalftime Report\u201d that the circuit is three years…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":695342,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[71],"tags":[427,99],"class_list":["post-695341","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-golf","tag-golf","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/695341","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=695341"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/695341\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/695342"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=695341"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=695341"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=695341"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}