21st Century Fox has scored a broadcasting hole-in-one.
The company's Fox Sports unit won the rights to televise United States Golf Association tournaments such as the U.S. Open, ending long-standing relationships with Comcast Corp.'s CMCSA +0.42% NBC Sports and Walt Disney Co.'s DIS -1.70% ESPN.
The 12-year agreement—which starts in 2015—includes a significant increase in fees and highlights the broadcast battle for major sports content, driven in part by Fox Sports's launch of Fox Sports1, a new 24-hour national sports network later this month.
The deal is a blow to NBCUniversal's NBC Sports, and its Golf Channel, which has tried to brand itself as the top destination for golf fans. While NBC aired the U.S. Open, the Golf Channel broadcast the U.S. Amateur and the Women's Amateur championships, among other programming. Also, ESPN will no longer show early rounds of U.S. Open golf. ESPN has been beefing up its major tournament coverage, picking up full rights to the British Open and Wimbledon, among others.
"The combination of NBC and Golf Channel will continue to be the dominant voice in golf coverage going forward," said a spokesman for NBC Sports. "We've enjoyed our 19-year relationship with the USGA and will continue to serve the golf fan every day."
A spokesman for ESPN said, "We look forward to televising the U.S. Open and other USGA championships in 2014 and wish them the best in the future."
Under the terms of the deal, Fox Sports will televise 146 hours of championship golf, including a minimum of 70 hours of live-event coverage of the U.S. Open, the U.S. Women's Open and the U.S. Senior Open on its broadcast network and its new cable-sports channel. Fox also as the rights to 10 national amateur championships and two international amateur team competitions, the Curtis Cup and the Walker Cup, and has committed to televising 76 hours of those competitions.
Glen Nager, president of the USGA, said that in addition to the increase in rights fees over the roughly $40 million the USGA has been collecting, the organization decided to go with Fox because of the network's record of reaching a younger demographic and coming up with new ways to televise sports.
"You look at what Fox has done when went into football and baseball," Mr. Nager said. "They have a record of innovation."
"We like big events and the U.S. Open is a big event," said Randy Freer, co-president of Fox Sports. "It allows us to bring another group of viewers to our network."