ONE Championship returns to Prime Video on Friday, Oct. 21, with ONE on Prime Video 3: Lineker vs. Andrade set to bring a stacked night of action to North American screens.
But with the future looking bright for the promotion, U.S. fans can also expect ONE to bring its live spectacle to American shores for the first time next year.
ONE Chairman and CEO Chatri Sityodtong joined Ariel Helwani on The MMA Hour on Wednesday and had positive news on that exciting topic.
“The first on-ground event is going to be Q2 of next year. I announced it at the business conference [2022 World Congress of Sports] yesterday,” Sityodtong said.
“Amazon’s global head of sports was there yesterday also speaking, Marie Donoghue, and so we have big plans working together. It’s a five-year deal, so we really are in earnest.”
Sityodtong discussed how ONE has planned a slow rollout into the U.S. market. Although it has signed with Prime Video for primetime distribution of marquee events, they understand that they cannot just go all-out right away.
Instead, ONE wants to build slowly to make sure all of the pieces are in place.
With multiple events planned for America next year – Sityodtong stated they are looking at doing at least two domestic shows in 2023 – the martial arts juggernaut is ready to take the U.S. by storm.
And Sityodtong is nothing but happy to have Prime Video as its lead partner in the new market.
“We have 12 primetime U.S. events with Amazon, and ideally, they want it all on-ground. We were the ones who said, OK, can we scale into it? It’s the pandemic, it’s COVID, it’s our first time in America. We want to get it all right. I think in this situation, it’s not about coming as fast as you can, but it’s getting it right. So our first show, we want to make sure we get it right, and then we build momentum from there,” Sityodtong said.
The lifelong martial artist also made it clear that they would be using their global rule set, including knees to a grounded opponent. He went on to state they have already had multiple states approve the rule set, and they will continue working with other commissions to open up more markets for live events.
“We have Rich Franklin working with the various athletic commissions and getting our medical system, our hydration process, and our rule set approved. He’s going state by state, so we’ve got a few states that have approved,” Sityodtong said.
The positive news will continue to build ONE’s momentum as it nears the new year. Following the ONE Lumpinee news, ONE’s foray into the U.S. market shows how they are tackling multiple markets and consistently growing around the world.