Group including 49ers minority owner agrees to buy Seahawks
Published 1:30 am Sunday, July 12, 2026
The Paul Allen Estate has agreed to sell the Seattle Seahawks to a group led by the Khosla family, which owns a minority interest in the San Francisco 49ers, the estate announced Saturday.
The agreed-upon purchase price is $9.612 billion, according to two league sources who were granted anonymity to discuss the confidential matter. Should NFL owners ratify the deal (at least 24 of the other 31 team owners must approve), it would set a record for an NFL franchise’s sale price, outpacing the previous mark by approximately 50 percent.
“We are honored to be entrusted as the next stewards of the Seattle Seahawks. We look forward to building on the winning legacy Paul Allen created and to earning the trust of the Seahawks organization and fans everywhere,” Vinod Khosla said in a statement on behalf of the Khosla family.
According to a memo the NFL sent to team executives, a copy of which was obtained by The Athletic, Neeru Khosla, an educator and entrepreneur, will serve as controlling owner of the Seahawks. She is believed to be the first minority woman to have sole control of an NFL franchise.
Vinod Khosla, a venture capitalist and co-founder of Sun Microsystems, and the couple’s son Neal Khosla, the CEO of AI healthcare company Curai, will also have interest. Neal Khosla, according to the NFL’s memo, is expected to have “a significant leadership role” in the ownership group. To adhere to NFL ownership rules, the Khosla family must divest its interest in the 49ers.
Allen’s estate announced it had begun the formal sale process of the franchise 10 days after the Seahawks defeated the New England Patriots in Super Bowl 60. It was the franchise’s second Super Bowl victory during the Allen family’s nearly three decades of ownership. Seattle also won four NFC championships and 11 division titles during the span.
The sale to the Khosla family will be the third time the Seahawks have changed ownership groups since the franchise joined the NFL as an expansion team in 1976. The Nordstrom family owned the team until 1988, when it sold it to real estate developers Ken Behring and Ken Hofmann for $80 million.
Behring had planned to move the team to Anaheim, Calif., but Paul Allen ensured it stayed in Seattle when he purchased it for roughly $200 million in 1997. He served as controlling owner until his death in October 2018 from complications from non-Hodgkin lymphoma.
The team was placed in a trust and his sister, Jody Allen, was named the executor and trustee of his estate. Per the terms of the trust, Jody Allen, was tasked with eventually selling the franchise, along with Paul Allen’s other pro sports interests, and donating the proceeds to charity.
The estate’s sale of the Portland Trail Blazers to a group led by billionaire Tom Dundon for approximately $4.25 billion was finalized in March.
The sale processes for the Blazers and Seahawks were led by Allen & Co., a boutique investment bank with no relationship to Paul Allen. The bank, according to the NFL’s memo to teams, “reported a very robust interest” in the Seahawks.
The Seahawks are the third NFL team whose controlling interest was sold in the last four years. The Washington Commanders were sold to a group led by private equity investor and Philadelphia 76ers owner Josh Harris for $6.05 billion in 2023. The Denver Broncos, held in a trust established by former owner Pat Bowlen, were sold to the Walton-Penner family for $4.65 billion in 2022.
