A British skilled wrestler is in talks with potential backers to safe hundreds of thousands of kilos in funding for a revamped European collection that may goal to capitalise on the game’s British fan base.
Mr Webb has enlisted Oakwell, the sports activities advisory agency which can also be engaged on efforts to draw personal capital into British biking, to advise on the fundraising and the event of the brand new product.
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The Undertaking Struggle staff is alleged to have held discussions with Sundown+Vine, the manufacturing firm and Paramount, the proprietor of Channel 5 within the UK, about collaborating on the brand new enterprise.
Talks with potential buyers are understood to have been underway for weeks.
If efficiently secured, the brand new funding could be raised at a pre-money valuation of roughly £10m.
The capital would enable Undertaking Struggle to interrupt even in its third 12 months, in response to its architects.
Mr Webb mentioned the challenge’s ambition was to “transform the UK and European professional wrestling landscape and create a business valued at over £100m over the next five years”.
It comes amid burgeoning curiosity in wrestling amongst worldwide audiences, with Netflix drawing practically 5 million international views for the debut of its RAW wrestling occasion in January.
In the meantime, All Elite Wrestling, based in 2019, has a US broadcast cope with Warner Bros Discovery mentioned to be value no less than $150m yearly.
Analysis means that as much as six million individuals in Britain alone think about themselves to be wrestling fans, with Undertaking Struggle aiming to faucet into that base and bridge the hole between die-hard and informal followers, whereas additionally aiming to assist the unbiased wrestling scene.
“There is a huge, passionate professional wrestling fanbase in the UK that lacks a domestic promotion to follow and is underserved by existing promotions.”
Mr Webb is a former two-times Tag Crew Champion in WWE with 16 years’ expertise wrestling the world over for WWE, AEW, TNA, New Japan Professional Wrestling, and different backers.
He additionally owns the Struggle Membership Professional model, which has staged reveals on the Birmingham NEC, in addition to in Tokyo, Mexico and the US.
Undertaking Struggle’s advisory board consists of Roger Draper, former chief govt of Sport England and the Garden Tennis Affiliation, and Peter Angell, the CEO of Sundown+Vine.
The enterprise can also be formulating a broader content material distribution technique aimed toward utilising wrestlers’ current social media followers, and content-sharing partnerships with main wrestling-adjacent influencers.
Mr Webb mentioned Undertaking Struggle would have a gender-balanced roster, together with feminine wrestlers from the UK, US, China, Japan, Australia, France, India, and Canada.
The roster of wrestlers being lined up is alleged to have a mixed social media following of greater than 12 million.
A premium pilot occasion is anticipated to happen subsequent 12 months, relying upon the profitable completion of the fundraising.
