Baguio City: A dream fight by Manny Pacquiao in Dubai may be highly unlikely, not because of the lack of interest, but purely because it will not make business sense.
"For years people, including officials in Dubai, have talked to me about doing a major fight in Dubai. There are problems with that," said Bob Arum, the promoter of Pacquiao.
"First of all the biggest source of revenue is from pay-per-view television in the US where people pay $50 [Dh183] a home to watch a fight and it is doubtful if you take the fight outside the US that you could stir up enough interest in the US to really drive those pay-per-view numbers," said Arum, the architect of several multi-million-dollar blockbuster fights in boxing.
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Arum says the same is true with Pacquiao as the biggest chunk of the boxing superstar's pay-per-view followers is from the US. He added that no advertiser-driven television can come even remotely close to the money made from pay-per-view television.
"Because the bulk of the income comes from pay-per-view, you have to do the fight in prime time in the US, so the fight will have to take place starting at 8pm in New York, which is 4am in Dubai. By the time the main event takes place, it would be 6am in Dubai," Arum explains.
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"I explained that to people in Dubai and they said who's going to come out at 4 in the morning to watch an event. So the idea that Dubai can do a major pay-per-view fight, whether it's Manny Pacquiao or anybody else, is to me an absurdity," added Arum.
"I don't think there's anybody in Dubai who wants to throw away their money to write me a cheque for $50 million to have a fight at 4 in the morning."
Arum said that experience and research have shown that the best time to hold a per-per-view event is on a Saturday evening in the US.
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"All our research shows that Saturday is the ultimate time that people will stay at home to watch a major event. We've done fights at some other time like Sunday afternoon, but it hasn't worked not only for boxing but for any other pay-per-view event.
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"It has to be on an evening preferably on a Saturday night. If you do it at 9pm in Dubai, it would be 2 in the afternoon in the US, and that's not a good time for pay-per-view television."
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