SportBusiness.com

Dubbed the American Airlines Center after the locally based carrier paid $195m (?223m) for naming rights, the 20,000-seat arena topped the $400m (?457m) price tag for Los Angeles' Staples Center, according to the reference book "Inside the Ownership of Pro Sports."
The red brick and limestone facade and terrazzo-tiled entryways replace the aging concrete of Reunion Arena, built in 1980 on the other side of downtown, as the Stars' and Mavericks' home. The building was named "Center" to avoid confusion with the American Airlines Arena in Miami.
"Five years ago, this was a dream, and now it's here," Stars owner Tom Hicks said at the ribbon-cutting ceremony.
Hicks, a Dallas business heavyweight who also owns the Texas Rangers major-league baseball team and heads the private buyout firm Hicks, Muse, Tate & Furst, teamed up with Dallas developer Ross Perot Jr. to build the arena.
There was a mixture of public and private financing, with the city contributing $125m ( ?143m) from taxi and hotel taxes.
The arena sits in a stretch of vacant former industrial land that the developers plan to turn into a large shopping, residential and office complex anchored around the facility.
The 840,000-square-foot (78,000-square-metre) arena seats 19,200 for hockey, 18,500 for basketball and 20,000 for concerts, using a $4m (?4.57) retractable seating system.
Technology touches include more than $9m ($10.30) worth of fibre-optic cable for high-definition and regular television broadcasts as well as video conferencing and Internet access.
The upper levels feature 142 luxury suites ranging in price from $150,000(?171,000) to $500,00 (?572,000) a year, with leather-upholstered seats for 12 guests, marble floors, flat-screen televisions, gourmet catering and Internet-connected computers.
The other luxury option is "platinum seating," wider and roomier than the standard seating and with access to private concourses with concessions including sushi and margarita bars. Platinum seats for the season cost from $7,000 (?7,000) to $18,000 (?206,000).
Amenities for regular ticket holders have also been boosted, with more than 200 food concessions, compared with 84 at Reunion, far more restrooms and improved sightlines.
Over the floor hangs an eight-sided scoreboard and a $1.5m (?1.72m) JBL sound system that developers say will improve concert quality. The first event in the new arena will be a Saturday concert by the rock group The Eagles.
The National Hockey League Stars open their season in the new center on Oct. 5 against the Nashville Predators, and the National Basketball Association Mavericks play their first home game of the season on Oct. 30 against the Detroit Pistons.
Reuters