MOTORSPORT: V8 Supercar chief vows he’s staying
Warburton denies reports he’s departing for a return to the media businessJames Warburton has vigorously denied that he’s giving up his job as V8 Supercar chief executive to return to the media industry.
Warburton, who has been with V8 Supercars close to two years, was tipped in Monday’s financial press to become the new head of FM radio network Southern Cross Austereo.
The Diary column in The Australian newspaper reported that Warburton was keen on the role and had been interviewed for it.
The Australian Financial Review’s Rear Window column said much the same and that the primarily pay TV deal for V8 Supercars that began this year was “imperiling major sponsorship dollars”.
Warburton has denied being approached about the vacancy at the helm of Southern Cross Austereo or that he was interested in it.
He said that he would be around “for the long haul” in V8 Supercars as long as the teams and Archer Capital, the private equity company that is the majority owner of the sport, wanted him.
A former sales supremo at the Seven network and briefly chief executive of Ten, Warburton has said that the $241 million, six-year TV deal that began this year with Fox and Ten has underpinned the financial viability of V8 Supercars.
He has said that the previous two-year deal with Seven had the sport “on its knees”.
Three Racing Entitlements Contracts (RECs) were handed back in the middle of that contract and Warburton has claimed another Seven might have been “benched” if not for the contract he struck with Fox-Ten.
That arrangement sees all V8 Supercar racing live on Fox Sports, six events simulcast on Ten, with packaged highlights of other rounds on the free-to-air network.
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