![Penn State mascot with Who Wants the Lion sign](https://cdn.statically.io/img/www.sportico.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/06/GettyImages-1443421774-e1718652830488.jpg?w=1280&h=721&crop=1)
Learfield and its former partner Penn State have settled a legal dispute that followed the school’s decision to commence a new 15-year multimedia rights agreement with rival Playfly this month.
Last week, the parties filed in federal court a stipulation of dismissal with prejudice—meaning the claims cannot be re-litigated in the future–saying that the matter had been “amicably resolved.”
It is not clear how the sides settled the litigation, which Penn State originally filed in December. A Learfield spokesperson declined to comment, and a representative of Penn State did not respond to an email inquiry from Sportico.
Learfield had served as Penn State’s multimedia rights holder for more than 20 years before the Big Ten school decided to strike a new deal with Playfly. Though Learfield has been attempting to offload a number of its college agreements in recent years, it would appear—based on its recent actions—that it was still hoping to maintain its foothold in Happy Valley.
In anticipation of its recent Learfield agreement expiring, Penn State issued an RFP for its athletics multimedia rights contract in late 2022. According to Penn State’s lawsuit, Learfield made a timely bid in advance of the school’s Dec. 22, 2022, deadline. About 10 months later, in November of 2023, Learfield submitted a second RFP bid, which was deemed untimely and noncompliant with the RFP process.
After being informed that Playfly had been awarded the bid, Learfield’s chief legal officer, John Raleigh, sent consecutive letters to Penn State indicating the company’s intent to formally protest the RFP process under Pennsylvania law, and demanding copies of records related to the selection.
In the first protest letter dated Nov. 28, 2023, Raleigh claimed that Penn State was legally prohibited from entering into a contract with Playfly, a decision he called “arbitrary,” “capricious” and “contrary to the RFP.”
“Learfield values its relationship with the University and wants to continue as the University’s multimedia rights partner for years in the future,” Raleigh wrote. “Learfield firmly believes that in a fair and transparent evaluation process, the University will determine that Learfield is the best partner.”
Learfield insisted it was entitled to review a slew of RFP-related documents, including “score sheets for each evaluator” and with internal email communications, based on the commonwealth’s public disclosure statutes.
For years, Pennsylvania’s so-called Right to Know Law largely exempted the state’s four biggest universities—Penn State, Penn, Temple and Pittsburgh—which are deemed state-related entities, since they aren’t government-owned but still receive millions of dollars each year in public funds.
However, two weeks before Learfield’s protest letter, Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro signed into law a bill requiring greater disclosures from those universities, though it is unclear the extent to which it would apply in this instance. Nevertheless, Learfield’s attempt to exploit public disclosure laws, given its previous positions on keeping records private, added an ironic twist to the case.
In response to Learfield’s allegations, Penn State filed a declaratory action in federal court on Dec. 5, seeking a judicial determination that the school could proceed with Playfly and was not required to provide its RFP materials to Learfield. After receiving an extension, Learfield was due to respond to the complaint by June 17. Instead, six days before that deadline, the parties informed U.S. District Judge Matthew W. Brann that they had reached an unspecified resolution.
Including Penn State, Playfly’s sports properties division now serves as the multimedia rights holder for 25 Division I schools. In 2022, the company inked a 15-year agreement with Nebraska, another Big Ten Learfield defector, which was reportedly worth $300 million.