UFC Fights for the China Market

s P O rt s BU s i n E s s
B y r ya n B a l i s
UFC Fights for
the China Market
I
Since coming under the ownership and
operation of Zuffa, LLC in 2001, Las Vegasheadquartered UFC has risen from largely a fringe
appeal to become the world’s fastest growing sports
organization and largest pay-per-view provider,
media industry data show.
Today, UFC programming is beamed around
the world to 150 countries and territories in 20
different languages, allowing the UFC to reach one
billion homes worldwide. In the U.S., the
organization’s largest market, the UFC has brought
MMA to a mainstream American audience, signing
a seven-year agreement with the Fox Sports Media
SANDS CHINA
The Ultimate
Fighting
Championship
(UFC) has
grown hugely
popular around
the world, and
now organizers
are aiming to
win over more
fans in this
part of the
world
n early November, the Ultimate Fighting
Championship (UFC) brought 18 of the
world’s preeminent mixed martial arts
(MMA) fighters to Macao to battle it out
before more than 8,000 excited fans at The
Venetian Macao.
As the first event in Greater China for the UFC,
the sport’s largest promotion, the Macao event was
a testament to the explosion in worldwide interest
in the UFC and the MMA style of fighting, which
involves a mix of martial arts disciplines, punching,
kicking and various “grappling” techniques like
wrestling, takedowns and submission holds.
UFC fighters exchange blows at UFC Macao
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UFC
“
Mark Fischer, left, poses with UFC fighters and others prior to the UFC Macao event
Group in 2011 and drawing nine million viewers in
its first Fox television broadcast last year.
Interest in the UFC also is on the rise in China.
The UFC says they have 21 million fans on the
mainland, and the organization has one of their
three foreign offices in Beijing.
During the Macao event, Insight interviewed
Mark Fischer, executive vice president & managing
director of UFC Asia, who talked about the
growing popularity of the sport in China and the
organization’s plans for making further inroads.
Below are excerpts from that interview, along with
a chat with MMA legend and UFC Hall of Famer
Chuck “The Iceman” Liddell.
Insight: Putting on a UFC event is a major
undertaking. Can you talk about what is involved,
and how much work it takes to plan and run a
UFC event?
Mark Fischer: “It’s a lot. We put a ton of detail into
our events. We try to have the best production
quality, production values of any kind of event
anywhere in the world everywhere we go. So, we
bring the whole circus over.
“Then you have all the tickets, the invitations,
the pre-parties and the post-parties. We’ve been
planning and marketing this event ever since
we sealed the deal with The Venetian about six
months ago.”
Insight: Foreign entertainers have many stories to
share about working with Chinese authorities and
getting permission to perform in China. Why did
the UFC choose Macao for the first event in the
Greater China region?
MF: “Three reasons. One, great facilities here,
great arena, hotel, the fact that they’re right
together. Logistics are excellent. Two, The Venetian
has been a great partner. Not only venue partner
but marketing partner, helping us to promote
throughout the, really, Hong Kong, Macao,
southern China region – the target for this event.
“Thirdly, Macao is a destination. It’s within a
couple hours of a couple billion people. We had
an opportunity to touch a lot of people through
this event while other locations wouldn’t quite have
the same effect.”
Insight: What are some of the challenges to
bringing the UFC to mainland China that may be
different from other markets?
MF: “China is a huge market with great potential
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In 10 years,
who knows, but
the Chinese
market
potentially could
be as big or
bigger than any
for us
worldwide.”
– Mark Fischer
for UFC, yet it is not a single homogeneous market.
It’s really many different markets, each with
different tastes according to geography and many
different levels of development. This presents a
couple unique challenges, one being how best to
reach and build a fan base among all the potential
constituents, and the second to stay focused on
priorities. Our first priority is building awareness
and educating potential fans about our sport on
one hand, and on the other to make sure our fans
have full access.”
Insight: Can you give me a guess how the sport
will grow and develop in China over the next five
to 10 years?
MF: “First, UFC needs to continue to build our
media exposure and programming for the China
market over the coming couple years. We achieved
great growth in this so far – now up to about 20
million viewers per week – but we still have a ways
to go to achieve mainstream awareness and a
critical mass of fans across the country.
“At the same time, we need to support the
development of Chinese MMA fighters, whose
entry and ultimately success in the UFC will make
squaring off with Chuck ‘the iceman’ liddell
UFC Hall of Famer Chuck Liddell is one of the most celebrated
fighters in UFC history. A former light heavyweight champion,
Liddell became an icon of the sport with his devastating knockouts,
trademark Mohawk and punishing fighting style loved by fans around
the world. Liddell retired from professional fighting in 2010 after a 12year career and today helps promote the UFC as vice president of
business development.
insight: Could you talk about how the UFC has changed
over the past half decade with the explosion of the sport?
Cl: “There’s a lot more fights, a lot more fighters out there. It’s
exciting. Like I was talking about earlier, when we first came in and
we’re taking guys that were a wrestler and trying to add striking and
jiujitsu to him. Or, you take a jiujitsu guy and try to add striking and
wrestling to him.
“Now, you’re having guys that are starting to come into the sport
that have been doing it all from the beginning. They started doing
MMA, they started doing the mixing. We were trying to put together
how do you train these three together.We’re trying trial and error. ”
SANDS CHINA
insight: What’s it like to be a UFC fighter? Tell us a little
about what it takes to become a UFC fighter.
Chuck liddell: “Well, it’s a lot of work. I’ve been in this sport for a
long time, and in the beginning we went around doing a lot of stuff in
the States trying to explain to people that we weren’t just some guys
that fell out of a bar and started fighting.
“... I’ve done martial arts since I was 12. I wrestled since I was
14. I did kickboxing for five years after wrestling in college ... I fell
into doing MMA because someone asked me if I wanted to do a
mixed fight because they knew I was a kickboxer and a wrestler. I
said: ‘Yeah sure, I’ll try it.’ And just loved it. I started learning jiujitsu
and put it all together.
“There are three basic parts to it: standing, striking, wrestling –
meaning takedowns, throws, ways to change it to keep it standing
or get it on the ground – and then jiujitsu, which is on the ground,
submission holds, chokes, arm bars, leg locks.”
insight: what did it consist of?
Cl: “Cardio work, we’re doing a lot of sprint stuff, we do a lot of
tire flipping, pushing wheel barrels, weights up a hill, a lot of bag work,
mitts, sparring, training with other people, wrestling – a lot of different
strength and conditioning stuff.”
insight: When you were fighting in the UFC, could you talk
about your training regimen and what you did to prepare
for fights?
Cl: “In the beginning, we were trying to figure out how to put it
all together and how to train for a fight for MMA. Nowadays, guys
have gotten really good at it. Coaches know what they’re doing. How
do you put together jiujitsu with the striking and the wrestling and
everything.”
“i wrEstlEd sinCE i was 14.”
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Chuck Liddell, right, meets a fan at an autograph session
them local and national heroes and thus really
spark passionate interest in the UFC. And finally,
we need to bring a major UFC event to one of
China’s big cities, which if the first two steps go
well I believe we can achieve within two years or
so. All of these initiatives will help grow other
business segments in China such as sponsorship
and merchandising, and brand extensions like
UFC Gyms.
“If all of these go well, there’s nothing stopping
UFC from becoming one of China’s top three most
avidly watched and followed sports properties
within five years, especially among the 20–40 yearold demographic. We’ve seen this growth trajectory
in other major markets globally, and with China’s
deep martial arts traditions, there’s no reason the
same cannot happen here. In 10 years, who knows,
but the Chinese market potentially could be as big
or bigger than any for us worldwide.”
Insight: How deep is the talent level of Chinese
mixed martial arts fighters? How do you develop it
further?
MF: “As of now the talent level is rather thin, but
there are signs of rapid development on the
horizon. Martial arts practitioners from other
disciplines, and even regular physical education
experts, are realizing that MMA is the trend, the
place where things are moving in their fields.
“There are now two well-established MMA
training centers, one at the Xi’an Sports University
and one at the Beijing Institute of Physical
Education, and several programs have been put in
place to train hundreds of coaches in MMA fitness
and MMA techniques. Gyms all over are starting to
offer MMA instruction and fitness training.
“Meanwhile, the UFC intends to establish our
own fighter development program, in which we
would bring over some of China’s top fighters for
elite training in the USA, and by exchange bring
over some of our top trainers and fighters to help
train their counterparts here. We would also
support with equipment and communication of
best practices, and possibly our own branded gyms
in the future.”
Ryan Balis is Senior Communications Associate
at AmCham Shanghai.
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