Exclusive: Sacramento Kings owner among 7 finalists to buy Ottawa Senators NHL hockey team

Sacramento Kings owner Vivek Ranadivé is one of seven finalists vying to buy the Ottawa Senators hockey team in a deal that could exceed $1 billion, the highest amount ever paid for a National Hockey League franchise.

A source who is familiar with details of the sale of the Senators said Ranadivé met on April 12 in Ottawa with the Senators Chief Financial Officer Erin Crowe, President of Business Operations Anthony LeBlanc and General Manager Pierre Dorion.

Also on hand was a representative of Galatioto Sports Partners, the group handling the sale of the team. Ranadivé also toured the Canadian Tire Center, home of the Senators, according to the source.

Sacramento Kings team representatives did not return requests to reach Ranadivé for comment.

The source, who could not give his name because he is not authorized to talk about details of the sale, said all seven finalists were invited to meet with team management and tour the arena.

The team was put up for sale after its longtime owner Eugene Melnyk died in March 2022. A stipulation of the sale is that the team remain in Ottawa.

Originally, 16 bidders had expressed interest in buying the Senators, but nine were eliminated around six-weeks ago because their initial bids were too low. The source said the minimum bid among the seven finalists was above $800 million.

The largest amount ever paid for an NHL team was the $925 million paid by the Fenway Sports Group, owners of the Boston Red Sox, to purchase the Pittsburgh Penguins in 2021.

Normally, finalists bidding for a professional sports team usually number no more than four, the source said. He said given that the initial bids among the finalists were over $800 million and the fact that there is a relatively large number of final bidders, the amount of money needed to win the team should be above $1 billion.

Final bids are due May 15 and the winning bidder will be announced shortly after that though the deal is not expected to close until this summer.

Similarities between Sacramento Kings and Ottawa Senators

Ranadivé and his ownership group bought the Kings for $534 million in 2013, a record for an NBA team at that time. The team is now estimated to be worth more than $2 billion.

Ranadivé made his fortune in the software industry. He sold Tibco Software Inc. in 2014, the company he founded 17 years earlier, receiving $316.4 million for his share of the enterprise, regulatory filings at the time stated.

His competitors to buy the Senators also have deep pockets.

They include a group led by Vancouver-born actor Ryan Reynolds and Markham, Canada-based developer Chris Bratty, Toronto-based billionaire Michael Andlauer, a part owner of the Montreal Canadians hockey team and Jeffrey and Michael Kimel of Toronto-based private equity firm, Harlo Capital, the source said.

If Ranadivé were to win the bid for the Senators, there would other similarities to his purchase of the Sacramento Kings.

The Senators play in a 26-year-old arena in suburban Ottawa. Team and city officials want the team to play in a yet to be constructed new arena in downtown Ottawa.

Disputes over who would pay for that arena have led to the Senators continuing to play in the aging Canadian Tire Center.

In Sacramento in 2014, a year after Ranadive bought the Sacramento Kings, the city council approved spending more than $200 million to build Golden 1 Center, almost half the estimated cost to build the facility. The Kings contributed the other half.

The Kings had been playing in the dilapidated arena in Natomas.

Both teams have seen less successful season in terms of their winning record.

The Senators have had their chances of making the playoffs shuttered for the last six years, most recently when they lost to the Florida Panthers on April 7, but their record of missing post-season play did not go as far back as the King’s 2006 date. The Kings, of course, broke out of their post-season drought this year.

Ranadivé has eyed other sports teams

In August 2022, the Sacramento Kings finalized an agreement to purchase majority interest in minor league baseball’s Sacramento River Cats and its West Sacramento stadium, Sutter Health Park, for what sources say was close to $100 million.

However, Randivé, the source said, lost out in a large international deal to buy the Chelsea FC soccer team from Russian billionaire Roman Abramovich in 2022. The team was bought by billionaire Todd Boehly and his consortium for $3.2 billion.

Boehly is a co-owner of the Los Angeles Dodgers.