Sacramento Kings Owner Vivek Ranadivé Buys Out Shares From Minority Stakeholders

The Sacramento Kings owner Vivek Ranadivé has acquired a minority share in the National Basketball Association (NBA) team, along with private equity firm Arctos Sports Partners. Though the franchise has not officially announced the size of the shareholding taken by Arctos and Ranadivé, it has named the minority owners who have sold their shares.

 “Ranadivé and Arctos Sports Partners have officially bought the shares of former owners Mark Friedman, Brad Jenkins, Mark Mastrov, Andy Miller and Kevin Nagle,” the Kings said in a statement.“They have been instrumental in our vision for the organisation and their commitment made it possible for the team to stay where it belongs – in Sacramento.”

The Sacramento Bee reported that Friedman, Jenkins, Mastrov, Miller and Nagle helped Ranadivé take ownership of the Kings from the Maloof brothers in 2013. “The Maloofs threatened to move the Kings to Anaheim and tried to sell the team and move it to Seattle,” the Bee reported. “Both plans were quashed by the NBA and the Maloofs eventually sold to Ranadivé’s group.”

Nagle later took to Twitter to clarify his new position within the franchise, saying that he only sold a portion of his shares and is still a minority owner.

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Sportico reported earlier this month that Arctos had agreed a deal to take a 17 per cent stake in the Kings, valuing the team at $1.8 billion. The report added that the deal for the Kings was set to be the largest private equity investment since the NBA relaxed its ownership rules to allow institutional investors.

Among one of the richest NBA team owners, Ranadivé is founder and former chief executive officer of TIBCO Software, a multi-billion dollar real-time computing company, and of Teknekron Software Systems. Before he bought the Kings, he was the co-owner and vice-chairman of the Golden State Warriors.