Amazon Prime Video will be home to exclusive NBA games starting in the fall of 2025 as part of a new 11-year broadcast rights deal with the league, a deal perhaps only possible because of the evolution of the streamer’s business model.

In a conversation at the Bloomberg Screentime conference this week, Amazon’s Head of Prime Video Mike Hopkins explained his view that the streamer would not have pursued NBA rights if not for new revenue coming from the platform’s integration of advertising in recent months.

Hopkins also expressed his belief that Prime Video will be profitable as a standalone service “very soon.”

“Mainly what we wanted is to have a business model with Prime and advertising and all the other lines of business that we have, that is viable in and of itself and economically profitable for Amazon, and that’s going to happen … very soon,” Hopkins said.

“That’s because we want to invest more. What I think is really exciting is that with the additional revenues that we’re generating, we’re pouring it back in. I don’t know that we would have done the NBA, for example, if we weren’t doing advertising.”

Amazon is reportedly paying around $1.8 billion annually for NBA rights. As part of the deal, Prime Video will air a bundle of regular season games, exclusive first- and second-round playoff series, and the Conference Finals in alternating years. Globally, Prime Video will also receive expanded broadcast rights in Europe and South America including the NBA Finals in alternating years.

Prime Video will also air three WNBA Finals over the course of the deal, which bundled rights for the men’s and women’s leagues together.

The streamer introduced ads to its platform earlier in 2024, and announced in early October it would roll out more ads in 2025.

Sports fans paying for streaming platforms may have previously believed the saving grace was that they could avoid commercials. But while that has proven not to be true, at least they can take solace in the fact that watching all those ads allows Amazon to consolidate more programming on Prime Video and give subscribers more bang for their buck.

[Bloomberg Live on YouTube]