The Private Equity Playbook: College Sports and the University of Utah

About this episode

This episode explores the University of Utah's groundbreaking move to accept private equity investment in college athletics.

In December 2025, the University of Utah became the first major college athletic program to take private equity investment, spinning off its commercial operations into a for-profit company. Half a billion dollars and a public university now answering to Wall Street. In this episode of our series The Private Equity Playbook, host Manpreet Kaur Kalra is joined by collaborator Anna Canning to trace how college athletics went from extracurricular programs serving educational missions to financialized assets in a private equity portfolio.

People in this episode

Host: Manpreet Kaur Kalra

Guest: Anna Canning

Topics covered

• private equity
• college sports
• financialization
• University of Utah
• athletic programs

Keywords

• private equity
• college athletics
• University of Utah
• financialization
• sports investment

Mentioned in this episode

Organizations: University of Utah

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