Day: September 2, 2025

• The NFL is kicking off its most demanding international season this year with seven games abroad.
• The NFL’s global strategy focuses on building international fan bases for long-term brand growth.
• This article is part of “The Business of Sports,” a series on the teams, leagues, and brands turning competition into big business.

When the Kansas City Chiefs and Los Angeles Chargers kick off their season in São Paulo on September 5, it will mark the first of seven National Football League games taking place outside the United States. This is the NFL’s most demanding international season yet.

“I think that the aggressive efforts Roger Goodell has undertaken seem to be paying off,” Andrew Zimbalist, an economics professor at Smith College, said of the NFL commissioner’s global strategy.

But Zimbalist said the payoff from the league’s international push isn’t from a revenue standpoint — at least not yet.

“They’re playing a longer-term game,” he said. Unlike other businesses, where a successful domestic product can more easily translate abroad, a professional sports team may take longer to sell internationally, because “leagues are organized within a country,” Zimbalist added.

Other US professional leagues, such as Major League Baseball, are also trying to expand globally, but have encountered setbacks. Despite hosting the season’s opening game in Japan, the MLB was unable to secure financing for a two-game Paris series that was to take place this summer. The league also canceled its plans to hold games in Mexico and Puerto Rico this season.

While the NFL continues filling seats in more countries, its current momentum didn’t materialize overnight. Teams have played regular-season matchups abroad since 2005 and preseason games since 1950. In 1991, the NFL even experimented with the World League of American Football, a league of teams from Europe and North America, which lasted only two years.

Through this, the NFL recognized that playing games on foreign soil alone isn’t enough to build a sustainable international business model. Now, the league is betting that its global efforts can succeed where others have stalled, with a strategy built on business partnerships and cultivating local fan bases around existing teams.

“Just having a game in a country is not enough, just having broadcast distribution is not enough, just doing social is not enough — it takes a comprehensive plan to activate and engage fans year-round,” said Gerrit Meier, the managing director and head of NFL International. “Games and media reach are key catalysts here, but they need the support of many other tactics, including dedicated local teams.”

A targeted strategy abroad

A key driver for the NFL’s expansion abroad has been its Global Markets Program, which gives clubs international marketing rights to specific countries. Teams can apply for rights in one or more countries, targeting locations that make the most sense from both a cultural and business standpoint.

Through the program, teams use targeted strategies to build fandom and brand awareness abroad. These include local events that engage directly with fans, such as watch parties, and encouraging participation in the sport through youth football clinics and the promotion of organized flag football.

It’s a smart approach that can grow local fan bases for teams while activating new sponsorship opportunities, including collaborations with “large brands the NFL hopes to cultivate over time,” said David M. Carter, an adjunct sports business professor at the University of Southern California and founder of the Sports Business Group, a sports and entertainment consulting firm.

With seven more NFL clubs having joined the program earlier this year, the league now has all 32 teams strategically aligned with one or more countries. Several franchises already participating also announced new partnerships.

For instance, the Seattle Seahawks signed a deal with TGI Sport to be the team’s strategy, events, and commercialization agency in Australia and New Zealand. Over the past year, the Seahawks have also formed international partnerships with companies, including Infront, Condor Airlines, and BDA Inc.

Measuring success beyond revenue

Carter told Business Insider that assessing the NFL’s global business strategy performance to date requires nuance. Indicators like increased streaming subscribers, more fans in seats, and a growing social media presence are some of the ways the NFL is measuring its international strategy’s success, beyond current or short-term revenue gain.

“Measuring international success is both objective, actual revenue generation over time, and subjective — longer term brand building that will eventually yield revenue as the NFL’s notoriety as a global sports brand continues to climb,” Carter said.

Other measurable indications that the league is on the right path have begun to emerge. For instance, the NFL’s international direct-to-consumer service Game Pass, operated by DAZN, saw a 23% increase in paying subscribers and a 47% jump in free users last year.

“Long-term, our success is defined by building fandom, which now exceeds 240 million worldwide,” Meier said, adding that more than half of the NFL’s engagement across its official social media accounts now comes from outside the United States.

It’s still unclear if expanding abroad will yield lasting revenue for the NFL. But its playbook is laying the groundwork for what could deliver financially in the long run.

“Our international goals are clear: bring our game to more fans globally, develop lasting fandom through grassroots initiatives, and build pathways for international players to reach the NFL,” Meier said. “Ultimately, our vision is for the NFL to be not just America’s most popular sport, but a global sport property for fans and athletes everywhere.”

• A judge has determined penalties against Google to address its illegal online search monopoly.
• The DOJ previously asked the judge to force Google to sell off Chrome and end exclusive deals.
• Google has vowed to appeal the judge’s ruling that found the tech giant to be a monopolist.

A federal judge has handed down his punishment against Google after ruling that the tech company’s online search business is a monopoly.

US District Judge Amit Mehta, in a 230-page ruling on Friday, barred Google from having exclusive contracts for its Google Search, Chrome, Google Assistant, and the Gemini app products as part of his remedy to the more than $2 trillion company’s monopoly in search.

But the ruling fell short of some of the most contentious demands from the US government. Mehta said Google would not have to divest from Chrome or Android.

“Plaintiffs overreached in seeking forced divestiture of these key assets, which Google did not use to effect any illegal restraints,” Mehta wrote in the Tuesday ruling.

Alphabet shares jumped more than 6% in after-hours trading.

In a landmark ruling last year following a 10-week non-jury trial in 2023, Mehta found that Google violated US antitrust law by maintaining a monopoly with its online search business.

“Google is a monopolist, and it has acted as one to maintain its monopoly,” Mehta wrote in the ruling at the time.

The legal showdown pitting the tech behemoth against the Department of Justice and a coalition of states sparked the biggest monopoly ruling since Microsoft faced a potential breakup nearly 30 years ago. In that case, a federal judge in 2000 ordered Microsoft to be split up, but the ruling was later reversed on appeal.

As part of its proposed remedies for Google, the Justice Department had asked the Washington, DC judge to force Google to sell off its Chrome web browser, end its exclusive multibillion-dollar deals with Apple, Mozilla, Samsung, and others to make Google the default search engine on web browsers and smartphones, and share search data with rivals. Chrome is the world’s most popular web browser.

The remedies hearing, which began in April and lasted for three weeks, saw testimony from Sundar Pichai, the CEO of Google’s parent company Alphabet, who argued that the DOJ’s proposed fixes amounted to a “de facto divestiture” of Google’s search business.

Pichai warned in his testimony that the government’s proposals would have “many unintended consequences.”

Artificial intelligence firms OpenAI and Perplexity have previously floated their desires to buy Chrome should Google be forced to divest Chrome.

“If Chrome is really going to sell, we should take a look at it,” OpenAI CEO Sam Altman recently told a group of reporters.

Earlier this month, Perplexity offered up $34.5 billion to buy Chrome. Search.com and Yahoo also expressed interest.

In an opening statement during the remedies hearing, a Justice Department lawyer said the court must prevent Google from using its search monopoly to dominate the AI market.

“Unless Google’s vast payments are eliminated, Google will likely win each search distribution opportunity, given the tremendous advantages it has accrued from over 10 years of monopoly maintenance,” DOJ lawyers wrote in a post-trial May court filing.

Google has vowed to appeal Mehta’s original ruling deeming the tech giant a monopolist — and it could be years before there’s a final outcome.

In a series of posts on X after the remedies hearing ended in May, Google said the DOJ’s proposals went “miles beyond” the judge’s decision and “would harm consumers, businesses and America’s tech leadership.”

“We still strongly believe the Court’s original decision was wrong, and look forward to our eventual appeal,” Google said in a post.

Meanwhile, Google still has more antitrust headaches ahead.

A Virginia federal judge ruled in April that the company holds an illegal monopoly in certain online advertising technology markets. A remedies hearing in that case is set to begin in September.