The Asian Tour is set to re-align with the DP World Tour and the PGA Tour in a formal partnership underlined by pathways and co-sanctioned tournaments, a move that means it will no longer act as LIV Golf’s important second tier.
The Asian Tour had partnered with LIV in 2021 before the league’s launch in 2022, when it created a lucrative group of tournaments called the International Series, which LIV golfers frequently teed up in. The series was central to the promotion and relegation element of LIV Golf, including the top two on its Order of Merit being promoted to LIV for the 2026 season.
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But after high-level discussions culminated during the Open Championship at Royal Birkdale, senior sources with knowledge of the negotiations told Golf Digest that the Asian Tour had rejoined the DP World Tour and PGA Tour ecosystem. An official announcement is set for Tuesday.
The new agreement between the three tours is highlighted by the addition of at least two co-sanctioned events between the Asian Tour and DP World Tour for the 2027, 2028 and 2029 seasons. The partnership also will award cards from the Asian Tour’s Order of Merit to both the DP World and Europe’s secondary HotelPlanner Tour. Once promoted to the DP World Tour, Asian Tour players can compete for one of 10 cards on the PGA Tour for the following season offered via the Strategic Alliance.
Asian Tour CEO Cho Minn Thant told Golf Digest that he had to consider the longevity of pathways for its members given the uncertain future of the LIV. Earlier this year, Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund announced it would no longer fund the league at the end of this season, leaving LIV Golf CEO Scott O’Neil in search of new investors to keep the league going in 2027.
“I think the timing is just right now, it’s all about timing,” Thant said. “We’d kept in touch [with the DP World Tour] over all these years. Six years ago, it was right for us to do a partnership with LIV Golf, but given the circumstances now, we’ve had to look at other options.
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“Pathways to different tours are very important for our members,” Thant continued. “We’ve got the Asian Development Tour, which feeds into the main tour. We’ve got several co-sanctions with other tours as well. I think over the last five years, our membership has become a little bit more cosmopolitan. There are a lot more foreigners playing in Asia now and they enjoy coming to Asia, but we also need a pathways to progress onto bigger tours.”
Left unsaid in this new partnership are the ramifications to LIV Golf. Multiple sources have confirmed to Golf Digest that national opens on the Asian Tour were a part of the league’s proposals as it was seeking new investors. However, due to its new PGA Tour-DP World Tour alliance, the Asian Tour and its events can no longer be offered as part of a theoretical LIV package, significantly reducing LIV’s inventory.
The Asian Tour also was used as a promotion and relegation mechanism for LIV to meet Official World Golf Ranking accreditation. LIV can still host its own qualifying school, but it no longer has a second tier to draw from.
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Thant, seen with then LIV Golf CEO Greg Norman in 2022, said it was the right time for the Asian Tour to partner with LIV then, “but given the circumstances now, we’ve had to look at other options.”
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Moreover, as O’Neil signalled a willingness to attach the league to prominent national opens, the new Asian Tour deal means almost all the prestigious country championships have PGA Tour or DP World Tour affiliations.
Christian Hardy, PGA Tour senior vice president of international, said the motivation for aligning with the Asian Tour was ensuring the Strategic Alliance is beneficial to tours outside of Europe and the U.S.
“Through our strategic alliance, we’ve been trying to form a very cohesive global network and alliances of international tours,” Hardy told Golf Digest. “And I think we wanted to make sure that we captured everyone possible to ensure that the top talent was making its way up to and strengthening our alliance partners, the DP World Tour and, ultimately, presenting the PGA Tour as a true north star in men’s professional golf around the world. [It was about] making sure that that alliance network made sense in all regions of the world, and Asian Tour was certainly a hole that we were excited to fill.”
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Ben Cowen, chief tournament business officer at the DP World Tour, said he would work with Thant and Asian Tour officials to determine what events would be co-sanctioned. Events that have previously been co-sanctioned between the DP World and Asian tours included the Hong Kong Open, whose list of champions includes Rory McIlroy, as well as the Maybank Championship in Malaysia and others.
“It’s great to work together again with the Asian Tour,” Cowen said. “We’ve had partnerships with them for many years and I think 1999 was the first time we co-sanctioned an event with the Asian Tour.”
It would seem logical that national opens would be among the candidates for the co-sanctioning given the DP World Tour currently oversees 17 of them, while they are also the bedrock of the Asian Tour.
It is expected that the DP World Tour will announce its 2027 schedule around September and the co-sanctioned events with the Asian Tour are likely to be a feature within that.
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National opens also would fit in with PGA Tour CEO Brian Rolapp’s intentions to allow the DP World Tour and other global circuits to shine during the last four months of each year.
“There’s a lot of attention around national opens,” Hardy said. “It’s also putting the PGA tour and hopefully together with the DP World Tour in positions where we can have very strong direct relationships with the best events around the world as we begin assembling a calendar of what we’re focused on in the fall.”
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