1. Private Money
A growing trend in Sports Franchises has been ownership by partnerships (seen in Baseball with the LA Dodgers, Philadelphia Phillies and San Fransico Giants) and companies (NY Knick's MSG Company and Toronto Maple LEafs owned by Bell Canada and Roger Communications). Before Guggenheim Baseball took control of the Dodgers from Frank McCourt, numerous private equity firms including KKR (famous for the 1989 RJR Nabisco buyout memoralized in
Barbarians at the Gate) emerged as potential bidders. At one time the Toronto Rapters' were owned by the Ontario Teachers' Pension Plan. TowerBrook Capital Partners experimented with Hockey Team ownership with a 70% stake in the St. Louis Blues. It's possible that private companies and private money would want the WWE, or at least the WWE assets. There's certainly a growing marketplace for selling digitized old content and it's possible that a private seller could find a movie studio or home-entertainment division interested in the assets from WWE Studios. While Vince McMahon's media image is a combination of brazen trailblazer and goofy carnival promoter, leadership from experienced private equity professionals may bolster WWE's imagine on wall street and continue to open new avenues for investment from major banks and hedge funds as well as opportunities for serious partnerships with other media companies. A detailed evaluation and reorganization of WWE may provide some cost-cutting measures that could seriously boost WWE's net income and eliminate boondoggle projects from the books.
CONCLUSION
The popularity of WWE Stock has rocketed Vince McMahon back to Billionaire status. His company stands at an important cross-roads as they attempt to launch a successful over-the-top WWE Network and negotiate a massive rights increase for their domestic television programs. While a publicly traded company, WWE is not at risk of a hostile takeover as vast majority of the voting rights are concentrated in the family-owned Class B shares. Still, for the right price, at the right moment, perhaps the WWE would entertain taking on a partner. Mass media companies such as NBCU would offer the holy trifecta (USA network for Raw, Xfinity/Time Warner Cable for PPV and Comcast/Time Warner Cable Internet for WWE Network). Meanwhile, internet innovators such as Netflix or Google have plenty of cash and could easily build on the foundation of the WWE Network to integrate the product into their services and continue to push the cut-the-cord narrative. Then again, the perfect replacement for Vince McMahon may be another crazy billionaire willing to stick his thumb in the eye of his critics while laughing all the way to the bank. While television pays the bills, the lifeblood of WWE is the touring program and therefore a partnership with a live event promoter would be an excellent alliance to grow their weekly domestic and international business. Or the future for WWE may lie with corporate America - embracing private money and optimizing the company to yield highest returns from segment and selling off the business operations that aren't going to be profitable. Finally, there's dark horse candidates that haven't even been explored. Consider New Japan Pro Wrestling - originally founded by charismatic star Antonio Inoki in 1972, NJPW was sold to Yuke's Co. Ltd (the video game company that made the WWE Smackdown! series) in 2005. In 2011, Yukes sold their majority ownership in the wrestling company to Bushiroad (Collectible Card Game publisher). They've seen a significant improvement in the quality, reach (launching worldwide iPPVs) and business in the last few years. While neither of those owners (Video Game Company or Collectible Card Game publisher) may seem like a natural fit, NJPW has been surviving and now thriving. The lesson here is that there may be a lot of good fits for the WWE which don't immediately appear feasible until you dig a lot deeper. WWE says they are in the business of "puts smiles on peoples' faces". That's the business of producing and selling a marketable product. If someone can prove to Vince McMahon they're even better at that then he is, who knows - maybe he will turn over the keys to the castle.