Jeff Bezos and Eduardo Saverin look set to become the latest tech giants entering the English football world.

The pair are part of a consortium that is set to buy a stake in 20-time English league winners Liverpool, according to a report from Sky News.

News of the deal first emerged last month, and Sky News business editor Mark Kleinman is now reporting that an agreement on a 30% stake is close to being announced by current owner Fenway Sports Group (FSG), which also owns the likes of the Washington Red Sox. We have contacted Amazon, Saverin’s B Capital and FSG for comment.

The consortium is being led by Amit Bhatia, the son-in-law of Indian steel magnate Lakshmi Mittal. Bhatia was until recently a major shareholder and boardroom player at English Championship side Queens Park Rangers, but sold his shares on the same day in initial report about the Liverpool deal emerged.

Liverpool are one of English footballs’ best-supported teams, having won multiple top division titles, especially in the 1970s and 1980s, and six European Cups – more than anyone else in the UK. They most recently won the Premier League in 2024-25, but finished a disappointing fifth, 25 points behind champions Arsenal.

Bezos has previously explored deals for the likes of the Seattle Seahawks, but this would represent the Amazon founder’s first major move into sports team ownership. His wealth is currently estimated at close to $300B.

Saverin, who co-founded Facebook alongside Mark Zuckerberg, now runs private equity company B Capital. He was previously part of a group that looked to take over Liverpool rivals Chelsea in 2022, but this would also represent a first move in the sports space. His wealth is estimated at over $30B.

Saverin left Facebook in 2005 when Zuckerberg effectively diluted his shares and relieved him of active duty – a situation that played out in Aaron Sorkin’s movie The Social Network, with Andrew Garfield playing the Brazilian-born Saverin opposite Jesse Eisenberg’s Zuckerberg.

Sky News reported FSG plans to make an announcement on the deal in “coming days,” but that this could push into next week. It will value Liverpool at $6B, making it one of the biggest investments in football history.

The news comes at a very delicate time for world football, with European association UEFA effectively at war with world governing body FIFA, whose President Gianni Infantino has faced a barrage of criticism after announcing a plan to sell off stakes in the World Cup to the likes of Joshua Kushner, the brother of President Donald Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner.

The plan was scrapped after UEFA and several other bodies rejected the plan. Infantino has been urged to resign, but it appears he has the support to continue in the role, at least for now.

Open Doors, the Locarno Film Festival’s Locarno Pro-organized co-production platform and talent development program for filmmakers from regions where artistic expression is at risk, has wrapped up its 24th edition, its second with a focus on the African continent. And on Monday, its winners were unveiled.

Following a three-year cycle dedicated to Latin America and the Caribbean, the program’s current focus is on voices from Africa through its Projects, Producers, and Directors programs. It provides training, mentoring, and networking opportunities.

The 79th edition of the Locarno Film Festival  runs through Aug. 15.

Check out the Open Doors 2026 winners below.

Open Doors Grant  
A total of CHF 50,000 sponsored by visions sud est (with the support of the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation), the City of Bellinzona, and the Open Doors initiative.   

CHF 20’000  to
A Vineyard for A Lobster by Talemwa Pius, produced by Emmanuel Gashumba (Gripmagic Uganda Limited), Uganda.

Synopsis: “The equatorial village of Rukumba has endured months of drought when suddenly snow falls overnight, an impossible event blanketing the land in white. Kamuturaki (48), a failed trader once mocked for selling winter jackets under the blazing sun, becomes an overnight success. Byeitaka (40), a disgraced preacher, declares the snow divine and sells melted snowflakes as holy water to frightened followers. Kagoro (38), the timid chairman, watches his authority erode as the village reorganizes itself around the miracle. When British envoys arrive promising support for Rukumba’s independence from Uganda in exchange for access to the snow for scientific research, the village committee embraces the deal as progress. As competing ambitions take hold across the village, tensions rise and unrest erupts, forcing Ugandan military forces to intervene. By the time the snowfall melts, Rukumba is no longer a community but a collection of competing interests, each convinced the miracle belongs to them.”
  
CHF 20’000  
Accept My Plea for Burial by Mohammed Sheikh, produced by Kadir Harbi (Aleel Films), Somalia/Djibouti .

Synopsis: “In a remote Somali pastoral village, two 12-year-old boys, Waasuge and Warmooge, spend their days herding goats and playing games. Their playful rivalry turns tragic when Warmooge dies after falling into a steep dry riverbed during a game. No one sees exactly what happened, and the only witness, a mentally unstable man, gives conflicting accounts that deepen the uncertainty. As the village gathers, grief hardens into accusation. Warmooge’s mother, Saluugla, refuses to bury her son without justice, believing burial without accountability would erase his death. The elder, Alamagan, attempts to resolve the conflict through customary law and religious counsel, but the absence of truth fractures the community. Rituals are performed, oaths proposed and broken, and tensions escalate as the unburied body decays. Despite Waasuge’s age and the lack of evidence, the village demands resolution. Understanding what the adults cannot admit, Waasuge makes a choice that ends the conflict.” 
 
  
CHF10’000  
Too Much Music by Aseye Fiagbe, produced by Aseye Fiagbe (Aseye Fiagbe Creative Studio), Ghana.  

Synopsis: “Too Much Music is a feature documentary about Kiki Gyan, a Ghanaian keyboard prodigy who rose to international fame as a teenager with Afro-rock pioneers Osibisa. As his musical contributions expanded without recognition, tensions around credit and ownership led him to leave the band and pursue a solo career across London, Lagos and New York, shaping African disco and funk in the process. Over time, the same system that profited from his brilliance proved indifferent to his vulnerability, and his life became reduced to a singular narrative of addiction and demise. Through archival material and testimonies from family and collaborators, the film reconstructs the forces that shaped his journey and asks how artists are remembered, who controls their stories, and what is lost when brilliance is reframed as failure.”

CNC Development Grant   
The CNC development prize is an incentive for the development of a project for the value of 8,000 euros.  
 
Chapa 100 by Ique Langa, produced by Lara Sousa (Kulunga Filmes), Mozambique.  

Synopsis: “In the busy streets of Maputo, 80-year-old flower vendor Sitóe offers brief moments of beauty to strangers passing through the city’s crowded “chapas”, the local minibuses that carry thousands of people every day. One morning, he meets Valentina, a vegetable seller in her seventies, and a simple flower sparks a quiet romance. Together, they dream of owning a small piece of land where flowers and vegetables can grow side by side. When a thief steals Valentina’s rented wig, Sitóe runs after him and is struck by a speeding chapa. The city moves on, but Sitóe does not. His spirit becomes tied to the very minibus that killed him, traveling through Maputo day after day among passengers carrying their hopes, grief, and exhaustion. Flowers slowly begin to bloom inside the vehicle, subtle signs of his lingering presence. One day, Valentina boards the chapa carrying the flower Sitóe once gave her. Surrounded by the quiet traces of his spirit, she feels his love beside her once again.”
 
Jury statement: “By awarding the CNC grant to the fiction project Chapa 100, directed by Ique Langa, the jury aims to support the development of a work imbued with genuine sensitivity and poetry. The jury was particularly moved by the film’s portrayal of a love story between two elderly characters – a rare theme in cinema – set against the vibrant backdrop of Maputo. Furthermore, the project’s artistic potential is reinforced by the director and producer’s strong commitment to establishing a robust international distribution strategy that would match the film’s universal appeal.”  
  
ARTEKino International Award  
Providing an incentive for the development of a project for the value of 6,000 euros.  

The Ones With the Tempered Flowers by Neema Ngelime, produced by Ivy Kiru (LBx Africa), Tanzania/Kenya.

Synopsis: “For Neema, being a woman has always meant a script: school, marriage, babies. When a doctor tells filmmaker Neema having children might be hard, she doesn’t expect it to confuse her. Those expectations wound her. Raised in a multi-religious home, her identity was forged by questions of what is haram and what would please Jesus. All Neema cared about was which hell she’d end up in. To her, the older women in her family are a mystery beyond work and family. Their lives feel prophetic to her own. Her sister and her try to rewrite their scripts through tarot. Her father taught her that anything is possible. Now he reminds her of her fate. She stages performances with her family, reenacting fragments of their lives. They believe these are fictions. But they’re memories, repurposed, hidden truths surfacing through play. This is the story of a woman studying her body’s relationship to self, society, and the political weight placed on women’s bodies in Tanzania, challenging duty masked as love.”
 
Jury statement: “ARTEKino aims to support emergent contemporary cinema through the ArteKino International Award and the ARTEKino festival. ARTE has decided to reward a young director, whose project is a performative essay and a personal journey that explores the expectations placed on women by family, society and tradition. This is the story of a woman studying her body’s relationship to self, society and the political weight placed on women’s bodies in her country.”  

Sørfond Award  
The prize consists of the participation at the Sørfond Pitching Forum at the Films From the South festival for one of the Open Doors Projects, which will be held in November this year in Norway.   
 
The Ones With the Tempered Flowers by Neema Ngelime, produced by Ivy Kiru (LBx Africa), Tanzania/Kenya . 
 
EAVE Award  
Together with the Film Fund Luxembourg, professional training organization EAVE will offer a scholarship for the EAVE Marketing Workshop worth EUR 4,000.   
 
Mamounata Nikiema (Pilumpiku Production), Burkina Faso  
  
Tabakalera-San Sebastian Film Festival Residency Award  
The prize consists of a residency in Tabakalera and taking part in the industry activities of the San Sebastian Film Festival, given in collaboration with the International Culture Center Tabakalera and San Sebastian Film Festival.  
 
I Live in V.I., by Ugochukwu Azuya, produced by Olubunmi Ogunsola (ENSEMBLE), Nigeria  
 
Jury statement: “We wanted to highlight the following project because it follows a great story that is set and represents a unique and specific spot of its country and has the power to connect with universal concerns like displacement, class struggle and housing and labor pressures.  It is also a project that could benefit from the platform of our festival so that it can open new ways of collaboration, and searching partnerships that allow the film to strenghten and fulfill its necessities. And also: because we believe that every each of us carries a little Florence that tries to make its way in a varied and complex world, we want to welcome the team behind I Live in V.I., so that its producer Olubunmi Ogunsola can come to San Sebastian and make it through with their amazing project.”
  
Rotterdam Lab Award  
In collaboration with IFFR Pro, a participant from the Open Doors Producers will have the chance to take part in the training workshop Rotterdam Lab in January 2027, together with a delegation of more than 70 emerging international producers.   
 
Adja Mariam Mahre Soro (Studio KÄ), Ivory Coast  
 
Jury statement: “For her highly professional approach to her work as a producer and entrepreneur, and for the integrity and commitment she has demonstrated in building and developing her company. Her dedication to strengthening the local ecosystem through training initiatives and international collaborations is equally remarkable. She is now ready to build meaningful collaborations and co-productions across the continent and throughout Europe.”
  
Organisation Internationale de la Francophonie (OIF)  
A consultancy prize to one selected feature film or series project directed by a national of an OIF Member State within the French-speaking Global South, produced or co-produced by a production company based in one of those same Member States.  
 
Sarah, by Pocas Pascoal, Angola  
 
Jury statement: “A film of revolution and independance, based on a moment in life of a revolutionary and independent woman, one of the first Black female filmmakers: Sarah Maldoror. Sarah by Pocas Pascoal is very promising narratively and visually and it will give space to a beautiful, multilingual, coproduction between several countries from Africa and Europe.”  
  
AFP Critics Prize  
Presented by African Film Press (AFP) LLC, a cross-regional publishing alliance covering the African film, television, and digital media markets. The AFP Critics Prize comprises a USD 500 cash award, a certificate, and ongoing editorial coverage of the recipient and their future work across AFP’s three founding publications: Akoroko, Sinema Focus, and What Kept Me Up.  
 
Submergido, by Ariel Añez, produced by Joseph Mata, co-produced by Ariel Añez (Maochas Filmes), Mozambique  
  
Jury statement: “Sad and poignant yet ultimately hopeful, it offers a moving and incisive exploration of the human cost of conflict, especially for those whose loved ones are directly involved in war.”  
 

EXCLUSIVE: Deadline can reveal that the BBC has joined Working Title’s new TV adaptation of Charlotte Brontë’s classic novel Jane Eyre, which will be led by The White Lotus and Sex Education star Aimee Lou Wood.

As we revealed earlier this year, Emmy nominee Wood is attached to play the indomitable heroine in the buzzy adaptation, which is being produced by UK powerhouse Working Title and is penned by Miriam Battye, a WGA Award winner for her work on Succession.

We understand the BBC is now attached to develop the project and become its broadcaster-financier.

The coming-of-age romance novel explores the moral and emotional development of orphan Jane Eyre as she searches for love, independence and social equality in 19th century England. Wood feels like a great match for the project, which is widely considered to be ahead of its time because of the heroine’s individualistic and humorous character and how the novel approaches topics of class, sexuality, religion and feminism. There will be other plumb roles, including that of Mr Rochester, the brooding master of Thornfield Hall.

The source material has inspired a number of film and TV adaptations over the decades but none for a little while. Ruth Wilson starred in the last major TV version in 2006, also for the BBC. Mia Wasikowska took on the role in Cary Fukanaga’s 2011 film (for BBC Films), and Charlotte Gainsbourg played Jane for Franco Zeffirelli in 1996. 2027 will mark the 180th anniversary of the novel’s first publication.

Sister Emily Brontë’s Wuthering Heights was the subject of a recent big-screen adaptation starring Margot Robbie and Jacob Elordi.

Wood is riding high after her Emmy, SAG and Golden Globe noms for Season 3 of The White Lotus and is in post on the movie Anxious People with Angelina Jolie. She was recently cast as George Harrison’s photographer wife Pattie Boyd in Sam Mendes’ Beatles movies, which are filming this summer.

Battye recently wrote the script for feature Extra Geography, which debuted at this year’s Sundance Film Festival. She is writer and exec producer on Apple and A24’s dramedy series The Husbands, starring Juno Temple.

Bridget Jones outfit Working Title has feature Sense and Sensibility starring Daisy Edgar-Jones coming out in September and recently teamed with Lena Dunham on Netflix series Too Much.

BBC and Working Title were not immediately available for comment.