The EuroLeague Board held this morning in Barcelona, which was attended by all the representatives of the competition’s shareholder teams, announced with great fanfare its unstoppable expansion plan with which it is on course to monopolize European basketball, taking a considerable lead over the NBA Europe project, whose launch is initially scheduled for the 2027-28 season.
The EuroLeague CEO, Chus Bueno, revealed in full detail the receipt of more than a dozen binding offers, with commitments already signed, from teams and investors who have demonstrated through duly signed documents their desire to become EuroLeague franchises starting from the 2027-28 season, in which the tournament will probably change format and be divided into two Conferences, in light of the growing number of teams.
These binding offers guarantee the competition revenues of more than 700 million euros by adding the fee—of varying amounts depending on their significance in the continental basketball market—that all the new partners will have to pay, binding contracts from several teams and cities including Valencia Basket, Dubai Basketball, PAOK Thessaloniki, Paris Basketball, Hapoel Tel Aviv, Partizan, and Red Star.
Consolidates and protects the seven major markets
In addition, it adds new highly strategic cities such as London, Rome and Naples to its unstoppable expansion, through which the EuroLeague manages to consolidate and protect the seven most important markets in European basketball: Turkey, Greece, Italy, Spain, Germany, France and Great Britain. In this way, it expands its borders, gains ground throughout European basketball and reinforces its dominance.
All these teams and cities demonstrate through their binding offers that they are fully committed to and excited about this project, as evidenced by the fact that, in addition to contributing more than 700 million euros among them as a fee, they will invest more than 3.2 billion euros in infrastructure.
They have already passed the first “due diligence”
All these new teams and investors have already passed the first “due diligence” by the Euroleague Board, an investigation, review, and verification process to confirm that they have the capacity and are sufficiently solvent and competitive to become franchises in the competition. Although final approval will be given by the Board of Owners or Owners’ Assembly, which will take place at the end of this coming September and from which the new franchises whose proposals are accepted will emerge.
Chus Bueno, who took the reins of the EuroLeague as its new CEO on January 30, 2026, and his executive team have managed in just eight months to keep the EuroLeague project moving forward in giant strides with its ambitious expansion plan that seems to have no ceiling, achieving exponential growth from both a quantitative and qualitative standpoint that allows it to consolidate its dominance in the European basketball market.
Long-term partnership agreements
“The EuroLeague is experiencing strong momentum, both commercially and strategically, with major renewals of long-term partnership agreements agreed in recent weeks and the launch of new events that continue to expand our platform,” Bueno explained.
The interest sparked by the franchise process clearly reflects the confidence that clubs, investors, and new projects place in the future of the EuroLeague
The EuroLeague CEO also highlighted the consolidation of the project: “At the same time, the interest sparked by the franchise process clearly reflects the confidence that clubs, investors, and new projects place in the future of the EuroLeague. The binding offers, close to 700 million euros, which represent a total investment of more than 3.2 billion euros over the next five years, demonstrate the strength of our business model and the value generated throughout the League”.
Money advanced by the clubs… for the clubs
An investment by the clubs that will benefit them entirely, not the organization. The EuroLeague has required all those investors to commit in writing to the money that is going to be advanced by the clubs for the clubs themselves. And that is the premise that best and most strongly stimulates the commitment and enthusiasm of all of them to back a competition of which the clubs themselves will be the only beneficiaries.
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