NEW YORK CITY, New York: After the company that owns the brand agreed with a new publisher for its print and digital products, Sports Illustrated (SI) said it will continue its operations.

Minute Media took over the publication this week after reaching a licensing agreement with Authentic Brands Group.

On January 19, Authentic announced that it was revoking the Arena Group's publishing license after Arena failed to make a quarterly payment.

Over the past two months, Authentic had been in negotiations with Arena, Minute Media, and other publishing entities.

Authentic will acquire an equity stake in Minute Media, but other terms, including the length of the deal, were not announced.

In a statement, Minute Media founder and CEO Asaf Peled said, "Sports Illustrated is the gold standard for sports journalism and has been for nearly 70 years across both print and digital media. The weight and power of that distinction cannot be understated. At Minute Media, our focus will be to take that legacy into new, emerging channels, enhancing visibility, commercial viability, and sustainable impact, all while ensuring that the SI team is inspired to flourish in this new era of media."

Minute Media will begin meeting with staff over the next couple of weeks to determine how many of SI's employees to retain.

In a memo, SI co-Editor in Chief Stephen Cannella told employees to continue operating as if it were business as usual for now.

Emma Baccellieri, SI staff writer and vice chair of the employee union that the NewsGuild represents, said, "We have said from the start that our top priorities are to keep Sports Illustrated alive, uphold the legacy of the institution, and protect our union jobs. We look forward to discussing a future with Minute Media that does that."

Once a weekly publication, Sports Illustrated was reduced to publishing biweekly in 2018 and became monthly in 2020.