DS: And your business model here is what?

LF: We call it the wheel. The UFC wheel. You’ve got your core— the pay per view. That’s essentially your product, right? And then, you know, you have spinoff things. You can sell it on DVD. Then after you sell it on DVD, you repurpose it and sell it too, put it in syndication on UFC Wired, or on Spike TV. Then you have products that you then put on the internet through VOD and other VOD platforms. Then you have other licensing opportunities like apparel and merchandise and video games, and all the way down. So it’s a complex business.

DS: Your fighters are getting paid less than boxers.

LF: Because it’s a different business model. In boxing, what happens is, the boxing promoter comes in, he doesn’t risk any capital. HBO comes in and does all the production. And does all the marketing. And they’re also carrying all the overhead. They got all the staff and everything. It shouldn’t be and it can’t be an apples and apples comparison. Now, do we make money? Absolutely we make money. But it’s not as simple as saying that boxers get paid 50% and we pay out 5-8%. That’s not correct. The guys that are complaining about their pay are making millions. I think Dana even put out there that—in '07, or '06, when Tito Ortiz fought three times, he made like 6 million dollars. Okay? And he’s the biggest guy saying I want to make more money.

And one thing that nobody could ever say about me or Frank or Dana is nobody’s check ever bounced, and we never went to anybody and said look, you know what, we can’t afford to pay you as much as we said . Everybody always got paid for the deal they were contracted for. And I will say this. We are the only promoters in the history of combat sport, that actually have paid fighters more than they’re contracted for.

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