MMS takes over Olympic media rights for sub-Saharan Africa from 2026 to 2032
Marketing & Media Solutions, known by the abbreviation MMS, is becoming the new regional partner of the International Olympic Committee for the distribution of free-to-view Olympic broadcasts in sub-Saharan Africa. According to the announcement by the International Olympic Committee, the agreement covers the period from 2026 to 2032 and includes the Olympic Games, the Olympic Winter Games and the Youth Olympic Games. This gives MMS the role of rights distributor for free-to-view coverage, that is, for content that should be available to viewers without a subscription barrier. At the center of the agreement is not only the broadcasting of major global sporting events, but also the effort to adapt Olympic content to television broadcasters and audiences in a large number of African countries. The agreement comes at a particularly important moment because Dakar 2026 will be the first Olympic sporting event held on African soil.
According to information published by the IOC, the rights package covers the period beginning with the Dakar 2026 Youth Olympic Games and continuing with the major Olympic cycles in Los Angeles 2028, the French Alps 2030 and Brisbane 2032. The package also includes the Dolomiti Valtellina 2028 Winter Youth Olympic Games, giving MMS a long-term framework for cooperation with local and regional television partners. Inside The Games states that the agreement includes more than 200 hours of free programming for the Summer Olympic Games and guaranteed coverage of winter editions. Such a model is important for markets where linear television still has a strong role, but also for media companies that increasingly combine traditional broadcasting, digital clips, studio shows and localized sports stories. For the IOC, expanding reach is one of the key goals of selling media rights, and this agreement fits into the strategy of keeping Olympic events visible to a broad audience.
The first major test will be Dakar 2026
The agreement will first be seen concretely through the Youth Olympic Games in Dakar, which, according to official IOC information, are scheduled from October 31 to November 13, 2026. That event will carry historical weight because Senegal will host the first Olympic sporting event on African soil. The Youth Olympic Games in Dakar were originally supposed to be held in 2022, but Senegal and the IOC agreed in 2020 to postpone them to 2026. The Olympic edition in Senegal is conceived as a sporting, educational and cultural festival for young athletes, but also as a symbolic step by the Olympic movement toward a continent with a strong sporting base. In the context of media rights, this means that Dakar will be the first indicator of how MMS can connect local broadcasters, national sports stories and wider regional distribution.
In its official description of Dakar 2026, the IOC points out that this is the fourth edition of the Summer Youth Olympic Games and an event that should emphasize Senegal's cultural diversity and Africa's growing role in the Olympic movement. For viewers in sub-Saharan Africa, it is important that the sporting event will not be presented only as an international spectacle, but also as an event taking place on the continent. This opens space for a stronger focus on young athletes from the region, local communities, schools, Olympic committees and national federations. If the announced model of free-to-view programming is implemented through a wide network of television partners, Dakar 2026 could have greater visibility than earlier editions of the Youth Olympic Games in many African countries. That is precisely why the agreement with MMS has both a communication and a development dimension.
Which competitions the rights package covers
The package agreed for the period 2026-2032 covers several key Olympic events. According to available information, it includes the Dakar 2026 Youth Olympic Games, the Dolomiti Valtellina 2028 Winter Youth Olympic Games, the Los Angeles 2028 Olympic Games, the French Alps 2030 Olympic Winter Games and the Brisbane 2032 Olympic Games. This gives MMS a multi-year portfolio covering both summer and winter editions, as well as competitions for young athletes. For broadcasters, such a package is important because it enables planning of programming, advertising sales, sponsorship partnerships and local sports formats over several years. For the IOC, the long-term nature is also important because it reduces market fragmentation and enables more consistent availability of Olympic content.
Los Angeles 2028 will be one of the commercially most important editions in this cycle, while Brisbane 2032 will round off the period covered by the agreement. The French Alps 2030 Olympic Winter Games bring a specific challenge because winter sports in many parts of sub-Saharan Africa do not have the same tradition as athletics, football, basketball or combat sports. Nevertheless, in its media rights policy the IOC emphasizes the widest possible coverage across different media platforms, so the inclusion of winter editions is part of a broader effort to present the Olympic movement as a whole. The Dolomiti Valtellina 2028 Winter Youth Olympic Games will additionally serve as a transition between major summer and winter events and as a continuation of the story about younger generations of athletes. In the official description of that event, the IOC states that existing facilities will be used, which is part of the broader emphasis on sustainability and the legacy of winter sports competitions.
Free availability as the key to the agreement
The most important part of the agreement concerns free-to-view rights, which means that the goal is to enable broad availability of Olympic content through television and digital channels that are not tied exclusively to paid subscriptions. According to Inside The Games, MMS will be the regional distributor of such rights among broadcasters in sub-Saharan Africa. This does not mean that every viewer in every country will automatically have an identical programming package, because final availability depends on local contracts, broadcaster capacities and programming decisions. Still, the model is aimed at ensuring that Olympic content is not limited only to premium sports channels. For markets with large differences in income, internet availability and penetration of paid television packages, such an approach has significant public value.
On its media rights page, the IOC states that it owns the global media rights for the Olympic Games on television, radio and digital platforms and that it grants those rights to media companies through negotiations on territorial agreements. The same page emphasizes that broadcast distribution is one of the main drivers of financing the Olympic movement, increasing the global popularity of the Games and promoting Olympic values. In that context, the agreement with MMS is not an isolated commercial arrangement, but part of a wider network of regional agreements that the IOC concludes for different parts of the world. Similar long-term arrangements exist in other regions as well, for example in Europe, Latin America, the United States of America and the Middle East and North Africa. Sub-Saharan Africa is now receiving a separate solution for a cycle that includes five Olympic and Youth Olympic events.
What the IOC says and what MMS says
Anne-Sophie Voumard, Managing Director of IOC Television and Marketing Services, said that the IOC is pleased with the agreement with MMS and the beginning of cooperation on securing high-quality free coverage of the Olympic Games and the Youth Olympic Games in sub-Saharan Africa. Her statement emphasizes two elements: availability and quality. In practice, this means that the rights holder is expected not only to distribute the signal technically, but also to work with broadcasters that can make the content relevant in individual countries. Localization of sports stories, selection of disciplines, emphasis on domestic and regional athletes and availability of highlights can be just as important as the broadcast rights themselves. In that sense, Olympic content becomes both a programming and editorial challenge.
Redha Chibani, CEO of MMS, according to Inside The Games, emphasized that the company wants to open a new chapter for the Olympic Games in cooperation with free-to-view broadcasters in sub-Saharan Africa. He highlighted the creation of a platform on which television broadcasters could build Olympic coverage adapted to their own audiences, stakeholders and sponsors. This is an important formulation because it shows that this is not just a centralized broadcast of the same content, but a model that leaves local partners room for their own programming identity. For media companies in the region, this may mean the possibility of developing pre- and post-competition shows, local commentary teams, interviews with national federations and special formats for social media. This can bring the Olympic product closer to viewers who otherwise do not regularly follow all Olympic competitions.
Territories covered by the agreement
According to the available list published by Inside The Games, the agreement covers 44 territories in sub-Saharan Africa. In Chad and Djibouti the rights are listed as non-exclusive, while Senegal is excluded from the rights for the Youth Olympic Games, which is important because Senegal will host Dakar 2026. Such exceptions in media contracts are not unusual because host markets are often regulated by special arrangements. The list of territories shows the breadth of the agreement and the complexity of distribution in a region with major differences in languages, media systems, market strength and viewing habits. In practice, success will depend on how quickly MMS manages to conclude local agreements and how visible broadcasters make the content in prime-time slots.
- The agreement includes Angola, Benin, Botswana, Burkina Faso, Burundi, Cape Verde, Cameroon, the Central African Republic, Chad, Comoros, Congo, Côte d'Ivoire, the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Djibouti.
- Also covered are Equatorial Guinea, Eritrea, Eswatini, Ethiopia, Gabon, The Gambia, Ghana, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Kenya, Lesotho, Liberia, Madagascar, Malawi and Mali.
- The list also includes Mauritius, Mozambique, Namibia, Niger, Nigeria, Rwanda, São Tomé and Príncipe, Senegal, Seychelles, Sierra Leone, Togo, Uganda, the United Republic of Tanzania, Zambia and Zimbabwe.
This territorial breadth is especially important for sports in which African athletes traditionally have a strong international role, such as athletics, combat sports and football disciplines in younger categories. Although the Olympic Games cover a much wider sports program, local interests often determine how much space individual competitions will receive in programming. In countries with a strong athletics tradition, such as Ethiopia and Kenya, it is expected that special attention will be paid to running disciplines and stories of young athletes. In West Africa, football, basketball and combat sports can be strong drivers of viewership, while island states and smaller markets can use Olympic content as an opportunity for greater international visibility for their own athletes. This is precisely where local editorial treatment can play a decisive role.
MMS already has experience in sports rights
MMS is a relatively new but already active agency in the field of sports media rights for sub-Saharan Africa. According to data published by sports and media sources, the company was founded in 2022 and is associated with the distribution of rights for football and athletics competitions in the region. FUFA, the Federation of Uganda Football Associations, stated in an earlier announcement that MMS and PC Plus are the official distributors for African qualifiers for the 2026 FIFA World Cup, World Athletics competitions in the period 2025-2029 and Asian Football Confederation competitions from 2025 to 2029. The European Broadcasting Union also announced that Hagerie TV's agreement for World Athletics Series broadcasts in Ethiopia was concluded through MMS, after a sublicense from the EBU as the exclusive distributor of World Athletics for sub-Saharan Africa. These examples show that MMS already works with the model of regional distribution to national broadcasters.
For the IOC, such experience is relevant because the Olympic program is not one event with several matches, but a huge combination of disciplines, schedules, signals, highlights, archival content and local promotional needs. The role of a distributor in such an environment includes negotiations, technical coordination, rights alignment, commercial positioning and support for broadcasters. If MMS succeeds in connecting its existing network of sports partners with the Olympic package, the Games could gain a more stable presence in countries where previous Olympic broadcasts depended on different and often fragmented arrangements. This will be especially important when audience attention must be maintained through announcements, qualification stories, documentary formats and content about young athletes. That is precisely why the long-term package until 2032 has greater value than a one-off contract.
Broader significance for the Olympic movement in Africa
The agreement with MMS should also be viewed through the broader position of Africa in the Olympic movement. The continent has produced a large number of Olympic medalists and globally recognizable athletes, but until Dakar 2026 it had not hosted any Olympic sporting event. The IOC therefore describes Dakar as a milestone, not just another edition of the Youth Games. If broadcasts and accompanying content are successfully distributed, the event can further stimulate interest in Olympic sports among young people, national federations and sponsors. Media visibility is often crucial for the development of sport because it affects investment, athlete recognition and the motivation of new generations. In that sense, the free-to-view model can have an effect beyond viewership itself.
At the same time, the challenges should not be overlooked. Sub-Saharan Africa includes very different markets, from large countries with developed media sectors to smaller countries with limited production infrastructure. Linguistic diversity, relations between public and commercial broadcasters, the cost of distribution and internet availability can affect the actual reach of the content. That is why the announced agreement will be successful only if it turns into concrete, locally visible broadcasts and programming formats. The IOC and MMS have so far presented the framework, while the coming months will show how it will be implemented ahead of Dakar 2026. For viewers in the region, the most important question will be simple: where will they be able to watch the competitions and how much programming will truly be available for free.
Sources:
- International Olympic Committee - announcement on the agreement between the IOC and Marketing & Media Solutions for Olympic media rights in sub-Saharan Africa (link)
- Inside The Games - report on MMS, the scope of rights, territories and statements by the parties involved (link)
- International Olympic Committee - official page on media rights and the IOC's role in granting rights (link)
- International Olympic Committee - official information on the Dakar 2026 Youth Olympic Games (link)
- Olympics.com - official Dakar 2026 event page with information on the postponement from 2022 to 2026 (link)
- International Olympic Committee - official information on the Dolomiti Valtellina 2028 Winter Youth Olympic Games (link)
- FUFA - earlier announcement on the role of MMS and PC Plus Group in the distribution of sports rights in sub-Saharan Africa (link)
- European Broadcasting Union - announcement on the agreement between Hagerie TV, World Athletics and MMS for Ethiopia (link)