Amazon recently announced that it has reached an agreement with Rogers for the exclusive acquisition of the broadcasting rights for Monday Night Hockey for the next two years, starting from the beginning of the 2024-25 NHL season. This agreement means that hockey fans will now be able to watch Monday Night Hockey exclusively on Amazon Prime Video.

The deal between Amazon and the NHL includes full production of the games, with the hiring of local Canadian talent to ensure the quality of production. Although not all details of this agreement have been disclosed yet, it is confirmed that long-time NHL sponsors and advertisers with long-term agreements with Rogers will have a right of refusal. Additionally, Amazon will respect current agreements with its historic clients.

The announcement of this acquisition was made ahead through Touché!, as Amazon's preferred partner, which allowed for discussions to begin with its long-time NHL sponsor and advertiser clients affected by this change.

This acquisition comes at a time when major streaming platforms, such as Amazon, are seeking to acquire live sports broadcasting rights. In 2021, Amazon had already signed an 11-year deal for Thursday Night Football, marking its entry into the live sports arena.

The agreement with Amazon for Monday Night Hockey includes the broadcast of 26 Monday night games, with 22 featuring a Canadian team.

This acquisition offers advertisers the opportunity to engage and measure audiences at every stage of the consumer journey. It will now be possible to link Prime Video views to e-commerce data, thus offering advertisers the opportunity to target audiences at various points in their purchasing journey. This reduction in the number of advertisers and the increase in the number of viewers will likely attract the interest of new advertisers.

This is a strategic move for Amazon, considering the growing value of live sports in the Canadian media landscape, underscoring the increasing importance of streaming platforms in the sports domain.