UK sports and TV production firm Whisper has been appointed as official host broadcaster for the next five editions of French tennis’ Roland-Garros grand slam tournament.
The deal with the French Tennis Federation (FFT) will see Whisper produce comprehensive coverage of the clay-court event every year between 2025 and 2029, for all the worldwide Roland-Garros broadcast partners.
Since 2021, the FFT has handled production services for the French Open at Roland-Garros in-house, albeit with assistance from HBS France Production, an arm of Host Broadcast Services.
HBS France Production secured those rights through a deal unveiled in early 2020.
The 2025 French Open is provisionally due to take place between May 25 and June 8.
Gilles Moretton, the FFT’s president, said: “We are delighted to have Whisper on board as the new host broadcaster of Roland-Garros. We will rely on Whisper’s expertise in audiovisual production to offer our television viewers the best experience possible.”
Whisper’s most recent significant partnership was unveiled in mid-April - a multi-year tie-up with the British and Irish Lions composite rugby union touring organization.
Through the deal, the duo have created the Lions Productions arm, which will produce a documentary covering the men's team’s tour of Australia in mid-2025. In addition, Lions Productions will produce an array of in-house and behind-the-scenes content for the Lions’ women’s team, which launched in January and will tour New Zealand in 2027.
The deal builds on - and formalizes - an original tie-up between the Lions and Whisper which was struck in advance of the team’s tour of South Africa in 2021. Out of that trip, the documentary Two Sides was created by Whisper.
In terms of Roland-Garros’ TV coverage, meanwhile, domestically the 2025 tournament will be shown by a combination of free-to-air France Televisions, and Prime Video, the sports streaming arm of online retail giant Amazon.
Other significant deals are in place across various Asia-Pacific territories, sub-Saharan Africa, Europe (via the European Broadcasting Union), and China.
