WWE CEO Nick Khan was a guest Tuesday at the JP Morgan Global Technology, Media and Communications Conference.
Khan said during his talk that WWE “doesn’t anticipate” Raw will change from its weekly three-hour format, while also saying it could move to another night if needed.
He also said WWE is open to adding a third hour to SmackDown.
He also again brought up that the 10:00 pm hour for Raw is still under consideration for potential adjustments that would appeal to a more adult audience.
He did confirm that WWE is still in the exclusive negotiating window with NBCUniversal on the renewal rights for Monday night’s and that they are now out of that window with FOX. He went on to say the window pertaining to FOX began during WrestleMania 39 weekend this past April.
Khan remains bullish on the TV rights interest for both Raw and SmackDown from both broadcast and streaming entities.
Khan gave no indication as to when a deal could be done with any interested party. Khan has said there is not a rush for it to be done as they want to do what is best to maximize the value for the company.
WWE and Endeavor, the owners of UFC are expected to complete a merger by the end of 2023. Together they will form a new publicly traded company called TKO. The deal, however does have to gain regulatory approval in order for the merger to be completed.
Other interesting notes that Khan talked about are below:
-NXT could be its own third brand with more crossover from Raw and SmackDown and be more than just a developmental brand.
-More content could be coming with “an additional show” on another night of the week: “Once that all of (TV rights) gets situated, we’ll look at other nights of the week to develop new content as well.”
-In talking about the future with UK TV rights, there are over 150,000 WWE Network subscribers at $10 USD per month in the region.
-The goal is for every premium live event to have a site subsidy fee like Cardiff, Wales, with Clash at the Castle, and Backlash in Puerto Rico.
-They see spikes on both Peacock and YouTube for older events in the lead-up to the new events, such as WrestleMania.
Contributing source for the above article: F4WOnline