Peter Smith, a long-standing executive at the IMG agency and the force behind the creation of the agency’s international broadcast rights business, has died at the age of 76.
Smith, who this year celebrated 50 years at IMG, passed away at the weekend after a long illness.
Tributes have been led by Mark Shapiro, president of Endeavor, the sports and entertainment group that owns IMG, describing Smith as “truly core to shaping IMG into the global powerhouse it is today”.
Smith joined IMG in 1971 as just the fifth employee hired by Mark McCormack’s then start-up agency and cut his teeth by representing emerging golfers and British tennis player Roger Taylor. At the time, he worked under the guidance of Martin Sorrell, who McCormack had hired to run IMG’s UK business.
He is best known in the industry for establishing the global media rights sales and distribution network within IMG. In 1984, Smith proposed to McCormack the concept of the TWI media arm as an entity that would represent international rights on behalf of existing and new clients, along with distributing owned and produced programming.
This led to the representation of media rights to the likes of golf’s Open Championship, US Open and US Masters, along with tennis’ Wimbledon. TWI also began to represent the international media rights of increasingly more sports bodies, including the likes of the NFL, NHL, MLB, NCAA, Nascar, PGA Tour, PGA of America, LPGA, the United States Tennis Association and Tennis Australia.
In the early days of TWI, a business now effectively known as IMG Media, the development of the world feed concept to lessen the reliance on the domestic broadcast signal was also at the forefront.
Paying tribute to Smith, Shapiro said: “I first met Peter in 2002 while I was at ESPN – nearly 20 years ago – negotiating tennis rights across the table. He was bright, shrewd and fiercely competitive.
“You had to be on your A-game with Peter, and no matter how tense or hard-fought the negotiations, you always wanted to do right by him. You wanted him to respect you.”
Chris Guinness, executive vice-president, head of commercial worldwide for media at IMG, added: “I owe so much to Peter. He recommended to Mark McCormack (founder of IMG) that I be given the opportunity to spread my wings in Asia back in 1996 and the development of my career since then has been entirely due to the recommendation he made.
“He was both a mentor and a friend and during my more recent nine-year stint in Hong Kong I can’t tell you how much I valued his advice and counsel. I had the privilege of having him to stay with us in HK which gave my wife Jo the opportunity to meet him and understand why he was such a special person in my life. I will miss him very much.”
Smith most recently lived in Connecticut but operated from different international IMG offices during his career. He moved from London to New York in 1973 to work for Jules Rosenthal, the founder of IMG’s licensing business (and the Arnold Palmer umbrella trademark). Licensing clients with whom Smith worked at the time included Australian tennis stars Rod Laver and John Newcombe.
A stint in Cleveland at IMG’s headquarters then followed as Smith worked in the agency’s team sports business, negotiating with team owners and general managers. He also helped IMG expand the division into football (soccer) and represent Kyle Rote Jr., one of the US stars in the sport at the time.
Over time, he developed IMG’s businesses in Canada, Latin America, India, Japan and Ireland.
Smith moved to Toronto in 1975 as IMG established a presence in Canada. Local Canadian versions of US-based televised events, such as ‘Superstars’ and the ‘Fifth Avenue Mile’, were introduced. During his ten years in Canada, Smith helped launch an ice hockey division, which eventually secured Wayne Gretzky as a client. Smith also moved to change the standard practice of US sports rights deals automatically including Canada and Mexico.
Smith was part of the team that set up IMG India in 1994 and was also asked to run the IMG Tokyo business between 1996 and 2001, spending every fifth week in the Japanese capital.
Elsewhere, Smith was involved in the creation of the Golf Channel, which launched in 1995 with the backing of Arnold Palmer. Smith used his international contacts to secure programming for the channel. Outside of sport, Smith helped to develop IMG Artists, the agency’s classical music business that was formed after the 1984 acquisition of Hamlen/Landau, a New York-based musical artist management agency.
Smith remained involved with IMG and its media business up until his death, retaining relationships with The All England Lawn Tennis & Croquet Club, The Royal & Ancient Golf Club of St Andrews and the LPGA. He also retained an involvement in IMG’s business operations in Canada, Korea and Japan.