Sports Illustrated’s Publisher Guts Staff. Future Unclear

January 19, 2024

Staffers at Sports Illustrated were notified on Friday of massive layoffs—some immediately, others in short time, with potential for the entire staff to be gone in three months.

Authentic, the licensing group that purchased Sports Illustrated for $110 million from Meredith five years ago, has terminated the agreement it holds with The Arena Group to publish SI in print and digital. That move comes three weeks after Arena missed a $3.75 million payment that breached the company’s SI licensing deal, which began in 2019. FOS