Fox upped their stake in the BTN (in which they already controlled a slight majority) to around 60% IIRC. I think it was negotiated in the last deal that the BTN would control the B10 rights for some undetermined about of time. Warren and the conference still has final say in who gets what though. Fox helps to advise though. Here's an article on it.
From the article:
Acurious situation has been afoot during Big Ten media rights negotiations this year that has caused a lot of head scratching by TV network and digital executives.
Two senior
Fox Sports executives —
Mark Silverman and
Larry Jones — are taking active roles during the conference’s media rights negotiations.
That means Silverman, Fox Sports president and COO, and Jones, Fox Sports executive vice president of business, have been in the room and listening intently as executives from rival companies —
Amazon,
Apple,
CBS,
ESPN,
NBC and
Turner — make their pitches for the conference’s rights packages.
Big Ten Commissioner
Kevin Warren leads these meetings, of course. He has run the conference for three years and has final say on which company ends up with the rights.
Kerry Kenny, the conference’s senior vice president of television, media, analytics and emerging platforms, also plays a big role during each of these meetings.
Executives say they’ve never encountered this type of situation before where they have had to make their pitch not only in front of a competitive network, but actually to its executives.
It’s all on the up-and-up, even if the situation is unusual. Sources say Fox Sports already has a deal in place to renew its Big Ten pact, so it’s not as though Silverman and Jones are gaining trade secrets as a way to enhance their own bid.
The presence of Silverman and Jones in these negotiations is part of a deal Fox Sports cut with the Big Ten when the previous rights agreements were signed in 2017.
The earlier deal gave
Big Ten Network control of the media rights to the Big Ten conference for an undetermined period of time. Silverman, who ran Big Ten Network back in 2017, was part of the negotiations with ESPN as a BTN rep back then.
This year, Silverman and Jones are taking part in these talks as designated representatives of BTN, the channel in which Fox Sports is a majority owner and the entity that controls the Big Ten rights.
Essentially, the two Fox Sports executives are acting as both designated BTN representatives and media consultants, which is one reason why the Big Ten did not hire a media consultant to help it through these negotiations.
A curious situation has been afoot during Big Ten media rights negotiations this year that has caused a lot of head scratching by TV network and digital executives. Two senior Fox Sports executives — Mark Silverman and Larry Jones — are taking active roles during the conference’s media rights...
www.sportsbusinessjournal.com